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The  Bremen  lectures  on  grea" 
religious  questions  of  to 


THE 


Bremen  ^Lectures 


ON 


GREAT  RELIGIOUS  QUESTIONS  OF  TO-DAY 

BY 

IDarioug  Eminent  European  Bivincs 


Translated  from  the  Original  German 

BY 

V 

DAVID  HEAGLE,  D.  D. 

Professor  in  Theological  Department  of  Southwestern 
Baptist  University 


A   NEW   AND    IMPROVED    EDITION 


PHILADELPHIA 

AMERICAN  BAPTIST  PUBLICATION  SOCIETY 

1898 


Copyright  1898  by  the 
American  Baptist  Publication  Society 


ffrom  tbe  Societie'g  own  ipress 


PEEFAOE' 

TO   THE 

JSTEW  AUTD  IMPEOVED  EDITION 


The  striking  excellence  of  the  Bremen  Lectures,  as  a 
defense  of  Christianity  against  the  assaults  of  modern  un- 
belief, has  been  widely  recognized.  A  common  verdict  of 
persons  who  have  read  the  book  with  intelligence,  is — as 
was  affirmed  in  the  preface  to  a  former  edition — that  it 
*' would  be  difficult  to  find,  at  all  events  in  English,  an- 
other work  wherein  is  included,  in  so  brief  a  compass,  so 
much  of  that  which,  with  the  present  helps  from  science 
and  thought,  can,  and  should  be,  said  "  on  the  themes  dis- 
cussed. In  other  words,  the  lectures  form  an  exception- 
ally  strong   and   successful   argument   in   support   of  the 

1  The  "Bremen  Lectures"  first  appeared  in  German,  in  1868,  during 
the  same  year  in  which  they  were  delivered  orally  in  the  city  of  Bremen, 
under  direction  of  the  Board  of  Internal  Missions  in  that  place ;  the  occa- 
sion preparing  the  way  for  them  being  certain  disorders  of  an  ecclesiastical 
nature  existing  in  Bremen.  In  the  first  English  edition,  as  also  in  the 
German  collection,  the  first  discourse,  by  Dr.  Christlieb,  was  wanting ;  it 
not  having  been  delivered  in  the  original  Bremen  course.  But  it  was 
inserted  in  the  second  English  edition,  to  supply  the  place  left  vacant  by 
the  failure  of  Dr.  Fabri's  lecture  to  appear  in  the  German  collection.  Dr. 
Fabri  having  been  one  of  the  speakers  in  the  Bremen  course.  As  pre- 
sented in  this  book  Dr.  Christlieb' s  lecture  is  really  a  condensation  of 
two  discourses  found  in  his  Moderne  Zweifel  am  christlichen  Glmtben, 
the  published  translation  of  which,  carrying  the  author's  approval,  we 
have,  with  a  few  changes,  followed  in  our  work. 

3 


4  PREFACE 

main  tenets  of  the  Christian  faith,  which  in  these  times 
are  being  violently  assailed  by  unbelief ;  and  in  accomplish- 
ing this  end  they  make  use  of  all  the  helps  which  the 
latest  science  and  thought  can  offer.  So  it  was  with  the 
production  at  the  time  when  it  first  appeared,  and  since 
then  the  conditions  have  not  materially  changed.  This 
means  that  in  all  essential  respects  the  material  of  these  ad- 
dresses is  still  as  fresh  and  as  well  adapted  to  needs  of  the 
day  as  when  it  was  first  published. 

Accordingly  it  is  believed  that  a  new^  edition  of  this  work 
will,  besides  meeting  with  an  extensive  welcome,  be  really, 
as  was  the  first  issue,  an  important  contribution  to  current 
Christian  apologetical  literature.  To  make  the  work  as  ac- 
ceptable as  possible,  the  present  publishers  have,  in  this 
edition,  introduced  certain  improvements.  Besides  furnish- 
ing a  summary  of  each  lecture  and  a  general  index,  making 
a  few  corrections  in  the  text,  and  altering  the  title-page, 
they  have,  with  considerable  painstaking,  been  able  to  secure 
the  portraits  of  all  the  distinguished  authors  of  these  dis- 
courses, the  faces  of  most  of  whom  have  been  quite  un- 
familiar in  this  country.  It  will  therefore  be  a  real  grat- 
ification to  the  reader  to  see  in  this  new  issue,  at  the 
head  of  each  lecture,  accompanied  by  brief  biographical 
notes,  a  correct  likeness  of  the  author  whose  production 
follows. 

As  to  the  state  of  things  in  Germany  which — as  appear- 
ing especially  in  the  city  of  Bremen — was  the  occasion  oi 
these  lectures,  it  may  be  remarked  that,  while  changes  more 
or  less  important  have  occurred  in  both  the  religious  faith 
and  practice  of  the  German  people  since  then,  still  the  gen- 


PREFACE  5 

eral  situation  remains  much  the  same/  In  philosophy  the 
reigning  systems,  if  there  are  any  such,  would  seem  to  be  at 
present  those  of  AVundt,  Von  Hartmann,  and  Lotze — espe- 
cially the  first.  And  these  systems  all  being  conceived 
from  a  Monistic  point  of  view,  and  being  affected  more  or 
less  by  either  Pantheism  or  Materialism,^  none  of  them  can 
be  regarded  as  fully  in  accord  with  Christian  doctrine. 
Still  Christian  ideas  have,  to  some  extent,  been  appropri- 
ated by  each  of  these  schemes  of  thought,  and  especially  has 
the  philosophy  of  Lotze  been  esteemed  by  many  of  its  ad- 

1  Dr.  Christlieb,  in  his  Moderne  Ziveifel  am  christUchen  Glauhen,  p. 
41,  says  of  religious  matters  in  Germany  at  the  time  when  his  book 
was  written  (1868,  2nd  ed.,  1870),  that  "the  great  mass  of  the  educated, 
yet  more  of  the  half-educated  classes,— the  diplomatists  almost  without 
exception,  the  great  majority  of  officers  in  the  army,  of  the  government 
officials,  lawyers,  doctors,  teachers  of  all  kinds  but  professed  theologians, 
artists,  manufacturers,  merchants,  shopkeepers,  and  artisans, — stand  on 
the  basis  of  a  merely  nominal  rationalistic  Christianity ;  while  the  lower 
middle  class  (that  is,  the  class  between  those  mentioned  and  the  very 
poorest)  carried  away  by  the  materialistic  tendencies  of  the  time,  assume 
a  more  or  less  hostile  position  toward  it,"  This  is,  however,  true  at 
present  of  only  that  portion  of  German  society  which  resides  in  towns 
and  especially  in  the  larger  cities;  the  vast  proportion  of  the  agricultu- 
ralists and  peasantry  still  confess  to  the  old  faith,  and  in  truth,  have 
never  ceased  so  to  do.  Besides,  a  new  and  better  order  of  things  has  of 
late  been  gaining  a  progressive  foothold  even  among  toAvnspeople  and 
the  educated.  A  larger  attendance  upon  public  worship  in  the  cities  is 
reported ;  increased  activity  obtains  in  church  construction  and  in  mis- 
sions, foreign  and  domestic.  Far  the  greater  number  of  pulpits  seem  now 
to  be  dominated  by  an  evangelical  spirit,  as  is  also  the  case  with  the 
theological  faculties  in  most  of  the  universities.  Moreover,  a  very  exten- 
sive evangelical  literature  has  of  late  been  produced,  and  at  many  points 
public  lectures  in  defense  of  the  old  faith  have  been  given.  So  taking 
all  of  these  indications  together,  it  would  seem  that  during  the  last  few 
decades,  positive  biblical  Christianity  has  in  Germany  been  making  con- 
siderable advancement. 

2  Von  Hartmann's  philosophy  is  thoroughly  pessimistic  in  its  teachings. 


6  PREFACE 

mirers  as  peculiarly  agreeable  to  the  Christian  view  of  the 
world.  In  theology  there  has  been  going  forward  lately 
quite  a  noticeable  movement  in  the  direction  of  what  may 
be  termed  a  more  positive  construction  than  before  existed 
of  the  Christian  doctrines  and  facts,  the  most  prominent 
representative  of  this  movement  being  perhaps  the  school  of 
Albrecht  Ritschl,  who  for  many  years  prior  to  1889,  the 
year  of  his  death,  was  professor  of  theology  in  the  Univer- 
sity of  Gottingen.  The  distinction  of  this  school  is  that  it 
emphasizes  the  religious  life,  and  puts  the  church  strongly 
forward  as  the  kingdom  of  God  on  earth,  considering  the 
divinity  of  Christ  and  other  gospel  facts  as  less  essential  to 
a  true  understanding  of  Christianity  than  these  more  prac- 
tical elements.  So  also  all  along  the  line  of  the  more  prac- 
tical interests  of  the  Christian  religion  has  there  been  of  late 
throughout  Germany  a  strong  awakening,  one  evidence  of 
which  is  the  increased  activity  everywhere  manifest  in  con- 
nection with  Inner-Missions. 

But  it  is  especially  to  the  serviceableness  of  this  work  in 
the  way  of  meeting  needs  which  exist  particularly  among 
Americans  that  attention  is  here  invited. 

1.  For  example,  the  book  gives,  throughout  its  whole  ex- 
tent and  especially  in  the  first  lecture,  by  Dr.  Theodor 
Christlieb,  a  full,  thoroughly  scriptural  and  therefore  cor- 
rect, doctrine  respecting  the  Divine  Being  as  he  is  in  him- 
self and  in  relation  to  the  universe  about  him.  More  than 
this,  the  different  non -scriptural  conceptions  of  God  are 
here  also  presented,  and  their  falsity  is  made  to  appear  by 
being  held  up  in  sharp  contrast  with  the  true  or  Christian 
view.     Thus,  for  instance,  that  notion  of  the  Deity  which 


PREFACE  7 

just  now  seems  to  be  quite  in  favor  with  not  a  few  American 
scholars — the  notion  which  represents  God  and  the  universe 
to  be  one  in  essence,  and  is  therefore  called  Monism — is  by 
this  first  discourse  in  the  present  work  made  to  appear  so 
erroneous  and  contrary  to  true  Christian  teaching  that  it 
needs  only  a  reading  of  the  discourse  to  have  the  untenable - 
ness  of  this  view  become  apparent/  In  like  manner  numer- 
ous other  erroneous  or  unscriptural  conceptions  of  God — 
such  as  are  taught  by  Pantheism,  or  Materialism,  or  Ka- 
tionalism,  or  still  other  isms  of  the  day — are  by  this 
work  shown  up  in  their  true  light,  and  while  any  verity 
contained  in  them  is  readily  acknowledged,  their  erroneous 
contents  are  also  thoroughly  exposed.  Thus  the  present 
volume  would  seem  to  be  excellently  adapted  to  correcting 
false  notions  respecting  the  Supreme  Being,  Avherever  such 
notions  may  be  held  ;  and  it  would,  we  think,  be  difficult  to 
find  a  more  correct  doctrine  in  general  touching  the  Deity 
and  his  relation  to  the  universe  than  is,  throughout  and 
particularly  in  the  first  lecture,  offered  by  this  book. 

2.  Another  service  which  the  following  work  is  capable 
of  rendering  to  whomsoever  may  need  it,  is  to  bring  out  in 
clearest  and  fullest  conception  a  correct  doctrine  Avith  re- 
spect to  the  supernatural,  or  touching  the  relation  of  a  truly 
spiritual  world  to  a  world  existing  under  the  laws  of  neces- 
sity or  that  is  physical  in  its  nature.  Such  a  teaching  is 
necessary  in  order  to  find  place  for  miracles,  or  to  make  it 
possible  that  any  intervention  of  the  higher  or  spiritual 
world  should  occur  in  this  lower  or  material  order  of  things. 
The  entire  revelation  given  in  the  Bible,  together  with  all 
1  See  especially  pp.  28-36,  also  152-161. 


8  PREFACE 

the  more  essential  facts  of  Hebrew  and  Christian  history, 
come,  it  may  be  affirmed,  under  the  head  of  the  super- 
natural ;  and  therefore  are  to  be  understood  only  as  a  cor- 
rect doctrine  of  this  subject  is  possessed.  Such  a  correct 
view  both  of  the  supernatural  and  of  its  relation  to  the 
natural  may  be  found  in  this  book.  For  that  reason  we 
esteem  it  to  be  a  production  of  especial  value,  particularly 
in  times  like  ours  when,  owing  perhaps  to  the  influence  of  a 
short-sighted  natural  science  or  of  a  materialistic  philosophy, 
many  persons  seem  to  have  lost,  with  regard  to  the  whole 
realm  of  the  supernatural,  much  of  their  faith.  (  Vide  lec- 
ture on  "Miracles,"  by  Pastor  Fuchs,  also  Lectures  VI., 
IX.,  audi.) 

3.  Again,  the  whole  teaching  of  the  Bible  with  respect 
to  the  personality  and  work  of  Christ,  his  resurrection  from 
the  dead,  and  the  atonement  which  he  accomplished  on  the 
cross — all  this  is  by  the  following  production  set  forth  with 
exceeding  clearness  and  fullness,  as  well  as  substantiated  by 
unusually  strong  argument.  And  the  consequence  would 
seem  to  be  that  if  any  person  will  inform  himself  touching 
these  topics,  as  t*he  knowledge  is  here  so  very  ably  fur- 
nished, he  need  not  be  subject  either  to  error  or  ignorance 
as  to  those  great  matters.  (Vide  Dr.  Luthardt's  lecture 
on  the  "Person  of  Jesus  Christ,"  Dr.  Uhlhorn's  on  the 
"  Resurrection  of  Christ  as  a  Soteriologico -Historical  Fact," 
and  the  discourse  by  Dr.  Gess  on  the  "  Scriptural  Doctrine 
of  Atonement.") 

4.  Still  another  service  of  a  doctrinal  nature  which  this 
volume  can  perform,  for  the  benefit  of  any  who  will  receive 
it,  is  to  furnish  him  clear,  comprehensive,  and  we  may  per- 


PREFACE  y 

haps  also  say,  thoroughly  reliable  views  both  of  the  written 
word  of  God  as  a  revelation,  and  of  the  certainty  of  our 
now  having,  in  the  New  Testament,  at  least,  a  revelation 
that  is  genuine,  or  one  that  can  be  traced  up  to  its  original 
inspired  authors.  One  of  the  most  scholarly  and  instructive 
contributions  found  in  the  book  is  the  lecture  by  Dr.  Con- 
stantin  Tischendorf,  on  the  '*  Authenticity  of  Our  Gos- 
pels ' '  ;  and  this,  we  may  observe,  is  his  latest  word  on  that 
important  topic.  (See  also  lecture  by  Dr.  Cremer  on 
''Reason,  Conscience,  and  Revelation.") 

5.  Lastly,  this  production  may  be  confidently  recom- 
mended to  readers,  both  in  this  country  and  elsewhere, 
because  of  its  presenting  in  a  wonderfully  wide-reaching  dis- 
course by  Dr.  J.  P.  Lange,  a  most  inviting,  and  from  a 
scriptural  point  of  view  one  would  say,  satisfactory  concep- 
tion of  the  "  Kingdom  of  God  as  Consummated,"  or  of  the 
final  things  in  the  history  of  our  world.  As  an  illustration 
of  the  extensive  sweep  and  deeply  penetrating  power  of 
modern  German  thought  on  a  religious  topic,  this  one  lec- 
ture is  sufficient  to  give  an  intelligent  critic  some  appreci- 
ative conception  of  the  high  character  and  worth  of  the 
book.  So  also  the  lecture  by  Dr.  Zockler,  on  the  ''Doc- 
trine of  Creation  and  Natural  Science,"  is  an  unusually 
meritorious  production  ;  containing  a  vast  array  of  facts, 
with  judicious  conclusions  drawn  from  them.  And  the  last 
discourse  in  the  volume,  the  one  by  Pastor  DisselhoflT  on 
"Christianity  and  Culture,"  has  been  regarded  as  par- 
ticularly important,  containing  much  well -selected  informa- 
tion and  numerous  wise  reflections  on  the  subject  consid- 
ered. 


10  PREFACE 

So  taking  all  these  lectures  together,  it  is  not  overrating 
their  value  when,  as  a  book  of  information  and  a  work  in 
the  line  of  Christian  apologetics,  they  are  declared  to  be 
exceedingly  important.  Hence  they  are  again  offered  to 
the  public  with  the  belief  and  hope  that  in  their  new  and 
improved  form  increased  benefit  will  be  accomplished  by 

them. 

The  Translator. 
October,  1897. 


PEEFATOEY  ITOTE 


My  attention  was  first  called  to  the  ' '  Bremen  Lectures ' ' 
soon  after  their  publication  in  Germany,  and  from  the 
kno^vn  ability  and  standing  of  the  authors  I  was  sure,  before 
reading  them,  of  their  high  character.  When,  therefore, 
at  the  request  of  my  friend,  the  Rev.  D.  Heagle,  who  pro- 
posed to  furnish  the  American  public  with  a  translation  of 
them,  I  gave  the  lectures  a  careful  perusal,  I  was  not  sur- 
prised to  find  them  rich  in  thought  and  admirable  in  style — 
indeed,  singularly  worthy  of  being  put  into  the  English 
language  for  the  benefit  of  American  readers  ;  for  they  are 
noble  defenses  of  the  Christian  religion  against  fierce  attacks 
from  living  adversaries  ;  and,  like  all  good  defenses  of  "the 
faith  once  delivered  to  the  saints,"  they  deal  with  central 
facts  and  principles,  and  possess  a  value  quite  independent 
of  controversy.  Accordingly,  without  wishing  to  endorse 
every  sentiment  expressed  in  these  Lectures,  I  believe  it 
simply  just  to  say  that  they  are  characterized  by  candor 
and  breadth  of  view  as  well  as  by  logical  force  and  zeal  for 
Christian  truth. 

The  translator,  a  German  by  descent  and  familiar  with 
the  German  language,  has  performed  his  task  with  fidelity 
and  skill,  giving  the  reader  the  true  flavor  of  the  original, 
yet  modifying  the  structure  of  sentences  so  far  as  to  make 

11 


12  PREFATORY    NOTE 

the  English  perspicuous.  Such  a  work  is  a  precious  gift  to 
the  people  of  God,  and,  with  the  blessing  of  his  grace,  will 
do  much  to  establish  their  hearts  in  the  present  truth. 

Alvah  Hovey. 


CONTENTS 


LECTURE    I. 

PAOB 

The  Biblical  Conception  op  God 15 

V 
BY  THEODOR   CHRISTLIEB,  D.  D.,  UNIVERSITY  PREACH- 
ER AND  Professor  of  Theology  at  Bonn. 


LECTURE    II. 

The  Doctrine  of  Creation  and  Natural  Science.    65 

BY  OTTO  ZOCKLER,  D.  D.,  Professor  at  Greifswald. 


LECTURE    III. 
Reason,  Conscience,  and  Revelation 105 

BY  HERMANN  CREMER,  D.  Z>.,  Professor  of  Theology 
AT  Greifswald. 


LECTURE    IV. 
Miracles.       .    .    ......_ 143 

BY  REV.  M.  FUCHS,  Pastor  at  Oppin,  near  Halle. 


LECTURE    Y. 

The  Person  op  Jesus  Christ 177 

BY  CHR.  E.  LUTHARDTy  D.  D.,  Professor  of  Theology 
at  Leipsic. 

13 


14  CONTENTS. 


LECTURE    VI. 

The    Resurrection    of   Christ,  as   a   Soterio- 

LOGICO-HISTORICAL   PaCT 207 

BY  GERHARD  UHLHORN,  D.  Z>.,  First  Preacher  to  the 
(LATE)  Court  of  Hanover. 

LECTURE    VII. 

The  Scriptural  Doctrine  of  Atonement.      .    .  249 

BY  W.  F.  'geSS,  D.  D.,  Professor  at  Gottingen. 


LECTURE    VIII. 

The  Authenticity  of  our  Gospels 277 

BY  CONSTANTnw    TISCHENDORF,  D.  D.,  Professor  OP 
Theology  at  Leipsic. 


LECTURE    IX. 

The  Idea  of  the  Kingdom  of  God  as  Consum- 
mated, AND  WHAT  IT  TELLS  US  REGARDING  HIS- 
TORICAL Christianity 301 

BY  J.  P.  LANGE,  D.  Z>.,  Professor  at  Bonn. 


LECTURE    X. 

Christianity  and  Culture 345 

BY  REV.  JULIUS  DISSELHOFF,  Pastor  and  Inspector 
IN  Kaiserswerth. 


LECTURE   I 
THE  BIBLICAL  CONCEPTION  OF  GOD 

By  THEODOR  CHRISTLIEB,  D.  D. 

UNIVERSITY  PREACHER  AND  PROFESSOR  OF  THEOLOGY  AT  BONN 


THEODOR  CHRISTLIEB,  D.  D. 


BIOGEAPHICAX, 


Dr.  Theodor  Christlieb  was  born  at  Birkenfeld,  Wiirtemberg, 
March  7,  1833.  After  having  studied  at  Tubingen  (1851-55),  he 
became  pastor  of  the  German  congregation  in  IsHngton,  London, 
N.,  in  1858.  Here  he  built  the  first  German  United  Church, 
comprehending  Lutherans  and  Eeformed.  In  1865  he  became 
town-pastor  at  Friedrichshafen,  on  Lake  Constance,  being  in- 
vited there  by  the  king  of  Wiirtemberg,  who  resided  at  this 
place  during  the  summer.  In  1868  he  was  made  professor  of 
practical  theology  and  university  preacher  at  Bonn.  In  1873  he 
attended  the  Evangelical  Alliance  Conference  in  New  York,  and 
read  there  a  paper  on  ''The  Best  Methods  of  Counteracting 
Modern  Infidelity,"  which  was  afterward  published  in  a  num- 
ber of  languages.  He  was  also  president  of  the  West  German 
Branch  of  the  Evangelical  Alliance,  and  attended  the  con- 
ferences at  Basel  (1879)  and  Copenhagen  (1884).  He  was  for 
some  considerable  time  one  of  the  editors  of  the  Allgemeine  Mis- 
sions zeitschrift.  His  publications  were  quite  numerous  ;  among 
the  more  important  of  which  may  be  mentioned  his  Moderne 
Zweifel  am  Christlichen  Glauhen,  which,  under  the  title  **  Modern 
Doubt  and  Christian  Belief,"  has  been  translated  into  English, 
and  has  had  a  wide  circulation  both  in  this  country  and  Great 
Britain.  Besides  being  a  superior  scholar  and  teacher.  Dr. 
Christlieb  was  a  powerful  speaker,  having  gifts  fitting  him 
especially  for  the  argumentative  religious  lecture.  He  died  at 
Bonn,  August  15,  1889. 


SUMMARY  OF  LEOTUEE  I 


Religion  the  greatest  ruling  power  on  earth — The  question 
regarding  faith  now  is  between  Christianity  and  nothing — Tlie 
non-scriptural  conceptions  of  God  diverge  into  three  main  ten- 
dencies, as  they  regard  the  Absolute  a  Material  Substance,  an 
Anima  Mundi,  or  the  Creator  of  the  world — Atheism  is  the  abso- 
lute denial  of  any  kind  of  ^eo? — Materialism  defined — Pantheism 
described — The  Deistic  and  Rationalistic  view — The  biblical  con- 
ception holds  fast  both  to  God's  supramundane  and  his  intra- 
mundane  character — This  idea  teaches,  against  Atheism,  the  ex- 
istence of  an  eternal,  unbeginning  God,  the  Creator  of  all  things 
— Against  Materialism  it  teaches  that  matter  is  not  eternal,  and 
is  in  nature  different  from  God — Against  Pantheism  it  holds  to 
both  the  antemundane  and  supramundane  character  of  God,  and 
to  his  difference  in  essence  from  the  world — Against  the  Rational- 
istic and  Deistic  view  the  scriptural  idea  holds  to  the  continued 
dependence  of  creation  on  God,  and  to  his  ruling  presence  in  the 
world — Atheism  is  absolute  falsehood  ;  but  it  rests  upon  the  ar- 
gument of  God's  invisibility,  a  truth  taught  by  the  scriptural 
notion — The  truth  of  Materialism  is  that  God,  though  a  Spirit, 
is  yet  substantial  (not  material)  in  his  being — The  truth  of 
Pantheism  is  that  God  is  omnipresent,  and  universally  active  in 
the  world — The  truth  of  the  Deistic  and  Rationalistic  view  is 
that  God  is  a  Personal  Being,  and  as  the  world's  Creator  is  yet 
separate  from  it — Thus  in  the  Biblico-Christian  notion  of  God 
all  the  separate  sparks  of  truth  concentrate,  or  are  focalized — 
Different  arguments  advanced  for  the  truthfulness  of  this  idea. — 
11.  The  Trinitarian  Conception  of  the  Divine  Nature.  This 
notion  as  expressed  in  the  Apostles'  Creed,  and  more  fully  de- 
fined in  the  Athanasian  Creed — Defects  of  the  Athanasian  defi- 
nition— Five  lines  of  argument  in  support  of  the  Trinitarian 
conception. 


THE 


BREMEN    LECTURES. 
I. 

TEE  BIBLICAL   CONCEPTION  OF  001). 
BY   THEODOR  CHRISTLIEB,   B.  B., 

UNIVERSITY  PREACHER  AND  PROFESSOR  OF  THEOLOGY  AT  BONN. 

rV#T  has  been  justly  said,  that  religion  is  the  greatest 

^1    ruling  power  on  earth.     Any  one  who  attentively 

C^J.    consideis  the  history  of  the  world  and  its  culture. 

V J    in  the  light,  not  merely  of  surface  events,  but  of 

the  internal  motives  which  determine  its  development, 
cannot  fail  to  apprehend  this  truth.  Even  Goethe  ac- 
knowledges,^  that  "  the  only  real  and  the  deepest  theme 
of  the  world's  and  of  man's  history  to  which  all  other 
subjects  are  subordinate,  is  the  conflict  between  faith 
and  unbelief."  As  long  as  the  religious  question  remains 
unsolved,  there  will  be  plenty  of  external  "  questions  "  on 
the  Tiber  or  the  Rhine,  in  Constantinople  or  in  Washing- 
ton. However,  since  the  French  revolution  in  the  last 
part  of  the  eighteenth  century,  the  religious  question  has 
entered  upon  a  fresh,  and,  if  I  am  not  mistaken,  upon  the 
last  stage  of  its  development.  The  issue,  taken  as  a  whole, 
lies  no  longer  in  isolated  dogmatical  differences  between 

1  In  his  Abhandlungen  zum  westostlicben  Divan. 

19 


20  THE  BREMEN  LECTURES. 

the  various  churches;  even  the  controversy  between  Prot- 
estantism and  Romanism  has  in  pubhc  life  become  a  sec- 
ondary question.  The  question  now  is,  whether  the  Chris- 
tian faith  in  any  form  shall  continue  to  exist.  The  battle 
of  centuries  between  belief  and  unbelief  is  in  our  days 
tending  more  and  more  to  the  point  where  the  decisive 
question  must  be  put,  whether  the  Christian  religion  shall 
be  retained  as  the  basis  and  rule  of  our  civilization,  or 
whether  it  must  as  such  be  wholly  abandoned.  "  To  be, 
or  not  to  be;  that  is  the  question"  nowadays  with  the 
Christian  faith;  and  this  question,  if  any,  must  be  the  last, 
just  as  two  thousand  years  ago  it  was  the  first. 

Nothing  indicates  this  so  clearly  as  the  present  shape 
of  the  controversy  about  the  idea  of  God.  And  we  may 
remark,  that  in  the  conflict  between  faith  and  unbelief  it 
is  the  idea  of  God  that  always  forms  the  heart's  core  of 
the  matter,  the  vital  question,  the  question  which  decides 
as  to  our  view  of  Christianity  in  general,  and  of  all  partic- 
ular dogmas.  This  controversy  is  not  the  same  now  that 
it  was  a  hundred  or  two  hundred  years  ago.  At  that  time, 
if  we  except  a  few  pantheists,  the  existence  of  a  personal 
God  was  not  generally  disputed ;  and  hence  the  only  point 
for  contention  was  God's  agency  in  the  world,  whether  he 
could  work  miracles,  whether  his  providence  extended  to 
all  things,  whether  Christ  was  truly  divine,  and  the  like. 
In  the  present  day,  however,  not  only  is  all  this  again 
called  in  question,  but  also  the  whole  existence  of  God,j 
and  consequently  the  existence  of  the  human  spirit  as  a 
distinct  essence.  Formerly  the  issue  lay  between  Biblical 
Christianity  and  deism  ;  now  it  lies  between  Christianity 
and  —  nothing;  between  belief  in  God  as  the  personal 
Spirit,  who  is  Love,  and  the  denial  of  God,  which  must  be 
the  denial  of  man's  spiritual  and  moral  being. 


THE   BIBLICAL   CONCEPTION   OF   GOD.  21 

It  would  be  an  unprofitable  and  thankless  undertaking, 
and  one  for  which  we  have  not  here  the  time,  for  us  to 
attempt  regularly  to  refute  the  innumerable  non-Biblical 
conceptions  of  God  which  have,  during  the  history  of  phi- 
losophy and  of  false  religion,  appeared  ;  moreover,  our  task 
just  now  is  rather  to  set  befoi-e  you  the  Biblical  conception. 
We  will,  therefore,  first,  only  notice  briefly,  in  the  way  of 
description,  X\\q  fundamental  forms  under  which  all  the 
non-Scriptural  ideas  of  God,  whether  of  our  times  or  of 
any  other,  may  be  included ;  and  then  pass  to  a  more  ex- 
tended examination  of  the  Bible  doctrine  with  respect  to 
this  subject.  This  course,  while  it  will  enable  us  to  see, 
by  comparison  and  contrast,  the  elements  of  truth  and  of 
error,  which  are  contained  in  the  various  non-Biblical  con- 
ceptions, will  also  help  us  to  perceive  the  untenableness  of 
these  conceptions,  as  also  to  appreciate  better  the  Biblical 
view  and  the  sure  foundations  upon  which  this  view  rests. 
All  views  of  God,  not  taught  by  the  Bible,  diverge  into 
three  main  tendencies,  according  as  they  regard  the  Abso- 
lute as  a  universal  Ifaterial  Substance,  as  an  impersonal, 
unconsciously  working  Anima  Mundi,  or  as  the  Creator 
of  the  icorld — personal  indeed,  but  not  exercising  any 
direct  influence  upon  its  present  life.  These  are  the  dis- 
tinguishing marks  of  the  systems  of  materialism,  panthe- 
ism, and  deism ;  but  before  describing  these,  let  us  first 
hastily  glance  at  atheism,  as  forming  the  most  direct  con- 
trast to  the  Scriptural  doctrine    of  God. 

First,  then,  Atheism :  this  is  the  absolute  denial  of  any 
kind  of  Oeoz,  that  is,  of  any  Divine  Being,  and  therefore 
cannot  be  classed  among  the  ideas  of  God  above  mentioned. 
This  view,  that  there  is  absolutely  no  God  at  all,  was  so 
much  detested  by  the  ancient  Greeks,  that  they  considered 
atheism  synonymous  with  wickedness ;  it  exists,  as  a  prin- 


22  THE  BREMEN  LECTURES. 

ciplo,  although  not  strictly  carried  out,  in  Buddhism  ;  and 
after  liaving  for  ages  appeared  only  quite  sporadically,  it 
first  assumed  the  character  of  a  system  —  if  indeed  it  be 
worthy  of  the  name  —  in  the  train  of  French  materialism. 
La  Mettrie,  for  instance,  pronounced  the  belief  in  the  exist- 
ence of  a  God  to  be  as  groundless  as  it  was  unprofitable ; 
and  during  the  "reign  of  terror"  under  the  Convention, 
when  the  "  Hebertists  "  laid  it  down  as  a  principle,  "  that 
the  King  of  Heaven  must  be  dethroned  just  as  the  kings 
of  the  earth,"  this  atheistic  tendency,  as  is  well  known, 
penetrated  the  mass  of  the  French  people.  Let  no  one 
imagine  that  the  tendency  is  as  yet  extinct;  nay,  quite 
recently  all  doubt  as  to  even  the  growing  power  of  athe- 
ism has  been  removed  by  the  blasphemous  "Manifestos" 
of  the  Commune  and  the  International,  as  well  as  by  the 
openly  avowed  aims  of  many  of  our  Socialist  Unions.  Of 
late,  too,  some  of  our  own  literati  and  poets  have  been  uyi- 
German  enough  to  try  to  transplant  this  tendency  into 
our  German  soil ;  and  there  are  also  philosophers  —  as, 
e.  g.,  Feuerbach  —  who  come  forward  as  its  advocates. 

Now  of  atheism  it  has  been  said,  not  without  good  rea- 
son, that  it  never  really  existed  as  a  full  conviction  in  any 
human  breast,  and  that  there  is  always  an  underlying  self- 
deception  whenever  any  one  professes  to  be  a  pure  atheist. 
That  a  person,  in  a  fanatical  over-estimation  of  reason, 
should  imagine  himself  able  to  know  and  investigate  ev- 
erything, and  curtly  deny  whatever  is  beyond  his  knowl- 
edge; or  that,  in  the  pride  which  refuses  to  acknowledge 
either  sin  or  its  Avenger,  he  should  believe  himself  all- 
sufficient,  in  base  dependence  on  the  world  of  sense,  deny- 
ing everything  that  does  not  belong  to  it,  and  thus  per- 
suading himself  that  no  God  exists,  —  this,  after  all,  is 


THE   BIBLICAL   CONCEPTION   OP   GOD.  23 

conceivable  enough.  But  that  one  should,  consciously  and 
conscientiously,  make  this  idle  notion  his  permanent  con- 
viction, and  that  he  should  not,  when  denying  the  Chris- 
tian's God,  venerate  aught  else  as  the  Divine  Power,  this 
is  difficult  to  believe,  even  apart  from  the  fact  that,  not- 
withstanding all  the  trouble  which  atheists  have  taken  to 
discover  but  one  nation  utterly  devoid  of  religious  con- 
sciousness, we  have  found,  down  to  the  present  day,  in  all 
nations,  even  the  most  degraded,  some  conception  or  other 
of  a  Higher  Being,  and  a  feeling  of  dependence  on  super- 
natural powers,  and  consequently  some  kind  of  religious 
exercise.  Cicero's  question  (De  Nat.  Deorum,  I.  16)  still 
holds  good  —  "What  people  is  there,  or  what  race  of  men, 
which  has  not,  even  without  traditional  teaching,  some 
presentiment  of  the  existence  of  Gods?"  But  it  is  not 
our  intention  to  discuss  the  being  or  the  non-being  of  a 
God  in  this  place;  so,  we  proceed  to  a  description, — 

Secondly^  of  Materialism ;  which  is  but  the  twin-brother 
of  atheism.  These  two  forms  of  the  denial  of  God  must 
necessarily  be  simultaneous ;  for  he  who  denies  God's  ex- 
istence is  unable  to  maintain  the  spiritual  personality  of 
man.  Historically,  materialism  either  precedes  or  closely 
follows  atheism.  The  two  play  into  each  other's  hands, 
and,  in  fact,  amount  to  the  same  thing.  For  the  latter 
must  ultimately  believe  in  the  eternity  of  matter,  and,  just 
like  materialism,  must  make  matter  its  God.  Between 
materialism  and  pantheism,  however,  a  distinction  must  be 
drawn.  Pantheism  considers  God  as  the  Soul  of  the  world, 
and  material  nature  as  his  body  only.  Materialism  merges 
God  in  matter ;  for,  according  to  it,  nothing  at  all  exists 
hut  matter^  —  there  is  no  such  thing  as  a  separate  spiritual 
existence.  All  that  exists  is  material;  and  that  which  is 
called  spirit,  or  spiritual  life,  is  nothing  but  a  function  of 


24  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES. 

the  life  of  the  body,  a  necessary  product  of  sensuous  per- 
ception,  and  of  the  nutritive  matter  absorbed  by  us,  but 
pre-eminently  of  the  action  of  the  cerebral  muscles.  Ma- 
terialism may  well  be  called  the  gospel  of  the  flesh  ;  it  is 
the  absolute  deification  of  matter  and  of  the  creature, 
traces  of  which  pervade  the  whole  history  of  mankind  from 
Babel  and  Sodom  onwards;  nay,  from  the  tasting  of  the 
forbidden  fruit  in  Paradise  down  to  our  own  days.  Every 
false  belief,  and  every  act  of  unbelief,  like  that  of  Thomas, 
involves  a  disposition  to  sensualism  and  materialism.  Ev- 
ery apostasy  from  the  living  God,  who  is  a  Spirit,  necessi- 
tates a  tendency  in  the  opposite  direction  to  the  deification 
of  the  flesh,  though  it  may  not  always  go  so  far. 

Hence  unbelief  has  constantly,  from  time  to  time,  landed 
in  materialism.  We  find  it  in  the  Buddhism  of  ancient 
India;  in  Greece,  among  the  atomists  and  the  sophists,  the 
Epicureans  and  the  sceptics;  also  in  the  middle  ages,  when 
the  Roman  church  clearly  betrayed  her  tendency  to  the 
worship  of  matter ;  and  again  in  the  seventeenth  and  eigh- 
teenth centuries,  as  the  ultimate  reBult  of  the  long-pro- 
tracted doubts  as  to  revelation.  In  our  own  days,  the 
materialistic  view  has  obtained  a  wide-spread  acceptation, 
owing  to  the  fact  that  many  natural  philosophers  assume 
the  entirely  material  descent  of  mankind,  and  make  out 
that  the  ancestors  of  our  race,  just  like  other  mammals, 
originally  sprang  from  the  primeval  slime.  In  Germany, 
too,  the  influence  of  this  school  has  been  no  slight  one 
during  the  last  decades  ;  L.  Feuerbach,  C.  Vogt,  J.  Mole- 
schott,  Biichner,  Czolbe,  &c.,  having  been,  and  still  being, 
the  chief  heralds  of  this  peculiar  wisdom. 

Thirdly^  we  more  particularly  describe  Pantheism.  This 
system  of  unbelieving  thought  derives  its  name  from  the 
motto  'h  xcxi  navj  i.  e.,  "  One  and  All,"  which  was  first 


THE   BIBLICAL   CONCEPTION    OF   GOD.  25 

brought  into  vogue  by  the  Greek  philosopher  Xenopha- 
nes.  According  to  pantheism,  God  is  the  universe  itself; 
heyoiid  and  outside  the  world  he  does  not  exist,  but  only 
in  the  world.  He  is  the  soul,  the  reason,  and  the  spirit 
of  the  world,  and  all  nature  is  his  body.  In  reality,  God 
is  everything,  and  besides  him  there  is  nothing.  Thus, 
making  God  the  soul  of  the  world,  pantheism  is  distin- 
guished, on  the  one  hand,  from  materialism,  according  to 
which  God  and  nature  are  immediately  identical ;  and,  on 
the  other  hand,  from  theism,  that  is,  from  the  belief  in  a 
self-conscious,  personal  God,  who  created  the  world  and 
guides  even  its  most  minute  details.  For  the  main  point 
of  pantheistic  belief  is,  that  this  soul  of  the  world  is  not  a 
personal^  self-conscious  Being^  who  appears  in  his  totality 
in  any  one  phenomenon  or  at  any  one  moment,  so  as  to 
comprehend  himself  or  become  comprehensible  for  us,  but 
that  it  is  only  the  one  ever  same  essence  which,  filling 
everything  and  shaping  everything,  lives  and  moves  in  all 
existing  things,  and  is  revealed  in  all  that  is  visible,  yet  is 
itself  never  seen.  Goethe  has  depicted  it  in  the  oft-quoted 
words,  — 

"I  rise  and  fall  on  the  waves  of  life, 
I  move  to  and  fro  in  action's  strife ; 
Birth  and  the  grave,  —  an  eternal  sea,  — 
A  web  that  changes  alternately,  — 
A  life  which  must  ever  glow  and  burn. 
On  the  whirring  loom  of  life,  in  turn 
All  these  I  weave,  and  the  Godhead  see 
Clad  in  a  robe  of  vitality."  ^ 

The  father  of  occidental  pantheism  was  the  Jew  Spi- 
noza (1632-1677).  "I  have,"  says  he,  "opinions  as  to 
God  and  nature  entirely  different  from  those  which  raod- 

1  Faust,  erster  Theil. 


26  THE  BREMEN   LECTURES. 

ern  Christians  are  wont  to  vindicate.  To  my  mind  God 
is  the  immanent  (that  is,  the  intramundane),  and  not  the 
transcendent  (that  is,  the  supramundane)  Cause  of  all 
things  ;  that  is,  the  totality  of  finite  objects  is  posited  in 
the  essence  of  God,  and  not  in  his  icilL  Nature,  consid- 
ered per  se,  is  one  with  the  essence  of  God."  He  also 
makes  out  that  "  God  does  not  act  in  pursuance  of  a 
purpose,  but  only  according  to  tlie  necessity  of  his  na- 
ture ; "  which  expresses  the  fundamental  view  of  every 
form  of  pantheism.  Even  Hegel's  conception  of  God,  as 
the  absolute  Idea  or  the  absolute  Spirit  which,  in  eternal 
self-movement,  proceeds  from  itself  and  becomes  nature, 
and  then  again  reverting  to  itself,  becomes  a  self-conscious 
spirit,  is,  in  truth,  only  another  name  for  the  same  thing. 
For  Spinoza  himself  distinguishes  between  nature  "  beget- 
ting" and  "begotten"  {natura  naturans  et  naturatd). 
The  latter  is  the  ever-varying  phenomenal  world,  the  for- 
mer the  intermittent  bourn  from  which  these  phenomena 
take  rise,  and  into  which  they  sink  again. 

Fourthly,  the  Deistic  and  Rationalistic  View.  In  many 
respects  this  view  is  the  antithesis  of  the  pantheistic.  Ac- 
cording to  pantheism,  God  exists  only  in  the  world  as  its 
soul ;  according  to  deism,  he  exists  only  above  the  world  as 
a  personal  Spirit :  by  pantheism,  God  and  the  world  are 
regarded  as  absolutely  inseparable;  by  deism,  as  abso- 
lutely severed,  and  as  not  merely  different,  but  divided  one 
from  the  other.  God  is  for  the  deist  a  personal  Being,  who, 
after  creating  the  world  by  his  will,  now  acts  towards  it 
like  an  artificer  with  a  finished  machine,  which  mechan- 
ically pursues  its  natural  course  according  to  the  laws  laid 
down  for  it,  and  no  longer  requires  the  immediate  assist- 
ance or  interference  of  its  maker.  Thus,  while,  on  the  one 
hand,  the  being,  personality,  and  supramundane  nature  of 


THE   BIBLICAL   CONCEPTION   OP  GOD.  27 

the  Deity  (hence  the  vague  and  awkward  term  "deism"), 
and  the  creation  of  the  world  by  him,  are  acknowledged, 
on  the  other,  any  continuous  active  presence  of  God  in  the 
icorld,  and  any  living  interposition  in  its  affairs,  are  de- 
nied. Hence  there  can  be  no  special  providence;  miracles 
are  an  impossibility;  in  fact,  every  particular  manifestation 
of  God  must  be  denied,  —  all  supernatural  elements  in  the 
Christian  belief,  even  those  involved  in  the  person  and 
work  of  Christ,  must  be  excluded,  and  everything  in  Scrip- 
ture bearing  on  these  points  must  be  explained  away  by  a 
reference  to  natural  causes. 

In  all  essentials,  then,  deism  coincides  entirely  with  what 
was  formerly  denominated  '■'■  naturalism ;'''' '^  for  it  pro- 
nounces the  laws  of  nature  to  be  adequate  to  the  contin- 
uous existence  of  the  world,  and  natural  religion  to  be  the 
only  essential  form  of  belietj  even  in  connection  with  Chris- 
tianity. It  likewise  agrees  in  principle  with  what  is  called 
rationalism,  the  essence  of  which  consists  in  the  position 
that  reason  is  not  merely  the  formal,  but  also  the  material, 
principle  of  religion,  and  supreme  arbiter  over  the  whole 
substance  of  the  Christian  faith.  At  the  present  time,  both 
in  German  and  English  theology,  the  rationalistic  principle 
has  but  few  representatives,  but  reckons  a  proportionately 
larger  number  among  Swiss  (Zurich),  French  (Strasburg), 
and  Dutch  (Leyden  and  Groningen)  theologians;  while 
the  great  body  of  educated  laymen,  and  especially  of  the 
students  of  modern  natural  science,  are  confessedly  under 
its  influence. 

1  At  the  present  day,  in  Germany,  naturalism  and  materialism  are  used  as 
nearly  synonymous  terms  for  the  theory  which  derives  from  the  operation  of 
the  laws  of  nature  only,  not  merely  the  continuance,  bnt  the  very  existence  and 
even  the  origin,  of  the  world;  whilst  in  England,  for  instance,  "  naturalism  " 
still  retains  its  original  meaning,  and  is  defined  as  "  the  denial  of  any  divine 
rule  and  providence  extending  to  individuals."  (Of.,  e.  g.,  Pearson  on  Infi- 
delity.) 


28  THE  BREMEN  LECTURES. 

These,  then,  are  the  principal  non-Biblical  conceptions  of 
God,  especially  as  current  in  the  present  day.  Let  us  now 
turn  to  that  view  of  the  divine  nature  which  is  given  us  in  the 
Christian  Scriptures.  This  we  shall  find  to  be  alone  fun- 
damentally true  and  scientifically  tenable.  And  the  truth 
of  the  Scriptural  conception  of  God  is  apparent  from  this, 
that  while  it  excludes  all  that  in  the  various  other  concep- 
tions must  he  recognized  as  false  aiid  negative^  it  combines 
in  a  livi?ig  imity  all  their  scattered  elements  of  positive 
truth.  We  have  a  twofold  problem  to  solve:  first,  to  ex- 
hibit in  general  terms  the  fundamental  Scriptural  concep- 
tion of  the  divine  nature,  i.  e.,  Biblical  theism,  and  estab- 
lish the  truth  of  its  various  principles ;  and  then  briefly  to 
justify  its  full  development  in  the  Christian  doctrine  of  the 
Trinity  as  the  deepest,  highest,  most  perfect  presentation 
of  the  idea  of  God. 


I.    Biblical  Theism. 

The  teaching  of  Scripture  concerning  God  is  based  on 
the  theistic  conception,  that,  namely,  which  holds  fast  at 
once  his  supramundane  and  his  intramundane  character; 
the  one  in  virtue  of  his  nature  and  essence,  the  other  of 
his  will  and  power.  For  while  theism,  on  the  one  hand, 
regards  the  Theos  (God)  as  a  personal  Being,  and  so  as 
essentially  distinct  from  the  whole  created  universe  and 
from  man,  it  is  no  less  careful,  on  the  other  hand,  to  pre- 
sent him  as  the  ever-living  and  working  One  in  his  imme- 
diate personal  relationship  to  man  and  the  universe  by  the 
doctrine  of  a  universal  Divine  Providence.  This  view  of 
the  divine  nature  is  virtually  expressed  in  the  first  verse 
of  the  Bible  :  In  the  beginning  God  created  the  heavens 
and  the  earthy  and  in  the  fundamental  article  of  the  Apos- 


THE   BIBLICAL   CONCEPTION   OF   GOD.  29 

ties'  Creed  :  I  believe  in  God^  the  Father  Almighty^  Maker 
of  heaven  and  earth.  Now  permit  me  hastily  to  show  you 
how  this  and  other  definitions  of  Holy  Scripture  exclude 
what  is  false  in  the  several  non-Biblical  conceptions  of  God 
which  we  described. 

And  first,  against  atheism^  which  we  need  scarcely  men- 
tion, Scripture  here,  as  everywhere,  teaches  an  eternally 
existing  un-beginning  God,  from  whose  creative  activity 
heaven,  and  earth,  and  time  itself  took  their  beginning,  — 
an  absolute  self-existent  One,  who  saitb,  I  am  that  I  am, 
having  in  himself  the  ground  of  his  own  being,  —  the  un- 
changeable, ever-living  One,  who  "hath  life  in  himself,  and 
therefore  hath  given  to  the  Son  to  have  life  in  himself" 
(John  5  :  26)  ;  "  who  is,  and  who  was,  and  who  is  to  come  " 
(Rev.  1:4,  8). 

Against  materialism^  we  find  a  protest  in  the  first  sen- 
tence of  the  Bible.  Matter  is  not  eternal.  It  had  a  begin- 
ning along  with  time ;  heaven  and  earth  were  created  in 
that  beginning.  Matter,  therefore,  cannot  itself  be  God, 
but  came  into  existence  through  an  act  of  his  will.  And 
he  is  distinguished  from  it  not  only  by  priority  of  exist- 
ence, but  also  by  difference  of  nature.  "  God  is  a  Spirit'''' 
(John  4  :  24),  that  is,  a  thinking  Being,  e.  g.,  "  Thy  thoughts 
are  very  deep  "  (Ps.  92  :  6)  ;  and  '■'■ofhis  wise  thinking  there 
is  no  end''''  (literal  rendering  of  Ps.  147 :  5). 

In  like  manner  we  find  in  those  first  words  of  Scripture 
a  protest  against  jt?«n^^eism,  with  its  confusion  of  God  and 
the  world,  and  its  assumption  of  the  identity  of  essence  in 
both.  God  is  both  antemundane  and  supramundane,  and 
as  to  his  essence  distinct  and  separate  from  the  world,  and 
existing  independently  of  it :  "  j?^  the  beginning  God 
created  heaven  and  earths  God  is  —  is  absolutely  and 
without  beginning;  the  world  is  brought  into  existence, 


30  THE  BREMEN  LECTURES. 

and  is  dependent  on  its  Creator,  not  he  on  it.  Moreover, 
it  comes  into  existence  through  him,  but  not  from  him. 
Every  theory  of  emanation  which  would  make  the  world, 
in  whatever  form,  old  Indian  or  modern  pantheistic,  an 
efflux  from  the  Divine  Essence,  is  from  the  first  excluded 
by  the  word  "  created,"  which  simply  expresses  the  fact 
that  the  world's  origin  is  derived  not  from  the  essence,  but 
from  the  will  of  its  Creator ;  that  its  production  was  not 
a  necessity,  but  a  free  act  on  God's  part,  who  is,  therefore, 
to  be  distinguished  and  separated  from  the  world  as  a  liv- 
ing, thinking,  willing,  and  personal  Being.  Throughout 
Scripture  God  speaks  as  a  person  —  I  —  who  does  not,  as 
Hegel  thought,  attain  to  self-consciousness  in  the  human 
spirit,  but  has  possessed  it  independently  from  the  begin- 
ning. So  little,  according  to  Scripture,  is  God  from  us, 
that  we  are  rather  from  him.  He  is  not  a  mere  Idea,  but 
Personality  itself,  absolute  Freedom,  and  the  highest  Self- 
consciousness,  —  the  prototype  of  all  other  self-conscious- 
ness, all  other  personality,  —  that  which  alone  and  eter- 
nally IS,  which  we  are  always  becoming,  who  is  before  and 
above  all,  and  from  whom  our  own  personality  is  derived 
(Gen.  2:7;  Eph.  4:6). 

Finally,  against  the  false  deistic  and  rationalistic  separa- 
tion between  God  and  the  world.  Holy  Scripture  makes 
like  protest  in  the  same  opening  sentence,  which  declares 
the  dependence  of  the  world  in  both  its  parts  (heaven  and 
earth)  on  the  will  of  Him  who  called  it  into  being.  The 
same  is  also  indicated  in  the  divine  names  most  commonly 
used  in  Scripture,  expressive  of  divine  power  and  might 
{Elohim^  El.,  Eloah^^  as  well  as  of  lordship  and  dominion 
{Adon,  Adonai),  and  indicating  at  once  the  essential  unity 
of  God  in  opposition  to  polytheism  (Deut.  6 : 4),  and  his 
fullness  of  living  energies :  hence  the  plural  form  of  the 


THE   BIBLICAL   CONCEPTION    OF   GOD.  31 

divine  name  Elohim^  used  ordinarily  when  reference  is 
made  to  the  Divine  Activity  in  the  creation,  preservation, 
and  providential  government  of  the  world  in  general.  God 
(it  tells  us)  makes  himself  seen  and  felt  by  us,  both  in  the 
universe  as  a  whole  and  in  its  smallest  details,  as  the  abso- 
lutely simple  and  yet  complex  Life.  He  is,  therefore,  in 
the  highest  sense  the  living  One  and  the  living  Agency, 
which  not  only  created  the  world,  but  also  continuously 
upholds  and  maintains  it :  who,  "  upholding  all  things  by 
the  word  of  his  power"  (Heb.  1 :  3),  and  in  his  omnipres- 
ence pervading  everything,  "  giveth  to  all  life,  and  breath, 
nnd  all  things  "  (Acts  17  :  25).  So  much,  too,  is  he  needed 
by  the  world  at  every  moment  of  its  existence,  that  all 
life  would  cease  were  his  influence  withdrawn  :  "  Thou 
hid  est  thy  face,  they  are  troubled  ;  thou  takest  away  their 
breath,  they  die,  and  return  to  their  dust"  (Ps.  104:  29). 
Whereas  deism  asserts  that  the  Creator  has  withdrawn 
himself  from  his  work,  and  is  now  far  removed  from  the 
world,  the  Scriptures  say,  "  He  is  not  far  from  every  one 
of  us  ;  for  in  him  we  live,  and  move,  and  have  our  being" 
(Acts  17:27,  28).  All  these  and  other  attributes  follow, 
still  more  clearly,  from  the  name  Jehovah.  In  foct,  this 
name  is  in  itself  a  complete  refutation  of  deism.  The 
latter  asserts  that  God  worked  on  one  occasion  only,  —  in 
the  creation,  —  and  that  since  then  the  world  has  sponta- 
neously followed  its  own  course;  but  Christ  says,  "My 
Father  worJceth  hitherto^  and  I  work :  the  Son  can  do 
nothing  of  himself,  but  what  he  seeth  the  Father  do ;  for 
what  things  soever  he  doeth,  these  also  doeth  the  Son  like- 
wise (John  5  :  17,  19).  The  Scriptures  teach  us  that  God 
can  work  miracles  (Luke  1 :  37)  ;  that  he  has  revealed  him- 
self in  special,  supernatural  modes  (Heb.  1 : 1,  ff)  ;  and  that 
even  now,  by  means  of  his  Spirit,  he  makes  himself  recog- 


32  THE  BREMEN  LECTURES. 

nized,  felt,  and  enjoyed.  In  short,  they  tell  us  of  God  as 
One  who  in  a  thousand  ways  every  moment  places  him- 
self in  mutual  relationship  and  active  communication  with 
man ;  who  lives  and  rules  not  merely  above^  but  also  ^7^, 
the  world;  from  whose  throne  the  current  of  life  flows 
down  to  all  creation,  and  lightnings,  thunders,  and  voices 
go  forth  in  every  direction  (Rev.  4:6,  11 :  19). 

It  must  now  be  evident  that  we  were  thoroughly  justi- 
fied in  applying  the  term  non-Biblical  to  those  other  con- 
ceptions of  God;  and  likewise  the  false  elements  which  we 
recognized  in,  particularly,  pantheism  and  deism,  —  viz., 
in  the  one  the  blending  together  of  God  and  the  world  ; 
and  in  the  other,  their  entire  separation,  —  are  excluded 
by  the  Biblical  conception.  But  here  let  us  observe  how 
the  scattered  sparks  of  truth  which  scintillate  amid  the 
darhness  of  the  other  ideas  of  the  Supreme  Being^  shine 
forth  as  one  clear  light  in  the  view  taken  of  him  in  the 
Bible. 

Atheism^  which  certainly  is  falsehood  itself,  and  there- 
fore does  not  contain  one  single  spark  of  truth,  rests  upon 
the  argument  that  nothing  is  to  be  seen  of  God.  Ac- 
cording to  the  Scriptures,  God  is  really  the  invisible  One 
(1  Tim.  1:17;  John  1:18).  So  far,  however,  from  this  attri- 
bute's diminishing  the  reality  of  his  being,  it  is  precisely 
that  which  certifies  to  his  true,  eternal  existence;  "for  the 
things  which  are  seen  are  temporal,  but  the  things  which 
are  not  seen  are  eternal  "  (1  Cor.  4  :  18).  The  invisibility 
of  God  is  not  a  defect,  but  a  prerogative.  For,  in  respect 
of  his  essence,  God  is  absolutely  exalted  above  everything 
that  is  created  and  visible,  and  he  cannot  manifest  him- 
self directly  to  the  creature,  but  only  in  some  shape  which 
has  a  certain  affinity  to  it. 

Materialism  identifies  God  with  nature  and  with  mat- 


THE  BIBLICAL  CONCEPTION  OP  GOD  33 

ter.  It.  lays  stress  on  the  element  in  the  being  and  work- 
ing of  the  Spirit  which  is  allied  to,  and  interwoven  with, 
nature.  This  aspect  of  the  truth  also  receives  its  full  due 
in  the  Scriptural  view  of  God.  According  to  it,  although 
God  is  Spirit,  he  has  nevertheless  a  nature,  which  we  may 
term  substantial^  but  not  material.  It  is  designated  as 
light  and  fire  :  "  We  declare  unto  you  that  God  is  light ; " 
"  Who  coverest  thyself  with  light  as  with  a  garment,"  &c. 
(1  John  1:5;  Rev.  21  :  23  ;  Ps.  104  :  2  ;  1  Tim.  6  :  16). 
"  Our  God  is  a  consuming  fire ; "  "a  fire  goeth  before 
him,"  &c.  (Deut.  4:24,  9:3;  Heb.  12:29;  Isa.  10:17; 
Ps.  97:3;  cf.  also  the  visions  of  the  prophets).  How- 
ever, this  element  of  light  in  God's  nature  does  not  exclude 
its  spirituality,  but  plainly  indicates  it. 

The  truth  in  pantheism  is  the  assertion  that  God  is 
omnipresent  and  universally  active  in  the  world.  We 
have  already  seen  that  these  attributes  are  assigned  to 
God  by  the  Holy  Scriptures  everywhere,  and  with  full 
emphasis.  They  entirely  separate  God  from  the  world  as 
regards  his  nature,  but  most  closely  connect  him  with  it 
as  regards  his  will  and  his  action.  The  Scriptures  cannot 
at  all  imagine  the  life  of  the  world  without  the  animat- 
ing presence  of  God  in  it.  As  an  infinite  Being,  far  ex- 
alted above  all  limits  either  of  time  or  space,  God  is  near 
to  every  being  in  every  place,  and  that  not  as  a  mere 
idle  looker-on,  but  quickening  and  maintaining,  helping 
and  directing  it  with  his  full  power  and  activity  (1  Kings 
8  :  27 ;  Amos  9:6;  Isa.  66  : 1 ;  Jer.  23  :  24;  Ps.  139  :  7,  10, 
105  : 7 ;  Matt.  28  :  20 ;  Eph.  1 :  23).  But  ^\\.hov.^ pervading 
every<:hing,  and  in  everything,  yet  at  the  same  time  he  is 
above  everything  (Eph.  4:6).  Biblical  Monotheism  does 
not,  therefore,  at  all  require  the  aid  of  pantheism  in  order 
to  maintain  a  constant,  living  relation  between  God  and 

c 


34  THE   BREMEN  LECTURES 

the  world.  The  Bible  teaches  that  God  is  the  fullness  of 
all  life,  and  therefore  recognizes  a  veritable  presence  of  God 
in  all  forms  of  the  world's  life ;  so  that  as  regards  the  full- 
ness, multifariousness,  and  intimacy  of  the  divine  presence, 
it  falls  short  neither  of  pantheism  nor  of  polytheism.  Fur- 
ther, pantheism  fears  lest  the  idea  of  personality  should 
involve  a  restriction  in  the  being  of  God ;  and  there  is 
truth  in  this  idea  to  the  extent  that  God  cannot  be  con- 
ceived as  a  single  Person.  He  would  thus  be  degraded  to 
the  level  of  other  personalities.  But  Holy  Scripture  also 
considers  him  not  as  a  single  person,  but  as  absolute  Per- 
sonality^ which  is  neither  limited  nor  restricted  by  any- 
thing else ;  which  is  not  a  numerical  One  beside  other 
single  beings,  but  is  both  Unity  and  Plurality  at  once,  i.  e., 
a  triune  Being.  Thus,  as  we  shall  hereafter  see,  room  is 
left  for  the  infinite  fullness  of  life  in  God :  and  yet  the 
great  prerogative  of  personality  is  firmly  maintained. 
Thus,  moreover,  full  justice  is  done  to  the  truth  involved 
in  polytheism^  viz.,  that  plurality  is  an  elementary  form  of 
being,  and  therefore  must  be  derivable  from  God.  Pan- 
theism likewise  demands,  not  without  reason,  that  a  self- 
conscious  God  must  from  all  eternity  have  an  object  which 
might  reflect  his  consciousness  into  itself;  but  according 
to  the  Biblico-Christian  view,  God  has  an  object  of  this 
kind,  existing  from  all  eternity,  in  the  distinction  between 
the  Persons  of  the  Trinity  in  his  own  being,  an  object 
which  renders  it  superfluous  to  suppose  that  the  world 
existed  from  everlasting.  Because  he  is  absolute  person- 
ality, he  does  not  exist,  or  come  into  existence,  in  or 
through  anything  else,  nor  does  he  only  receive  self-con- 
sciousness through  something  which  encounters  him,  and 
causes  him  to  revert  upon  himself;  but  he  derives  it  from 
himself,  and  it  flows  to  him  out  of  his  own  essence.     For 


THE   BIBLICAL   CONCEPTION   OF   GOD  35 

he  is  not  merely  TJ  but  also  constitutes  himself  as  He ; 
hence  he  can  say  of  himself,  I  am  He  (Deut.  32  :  39 ;  Isa. 
41 :  4,  43  :  10,  13,  25,  48  :  12).  He  is  himself  both  subject 
and  object. 

The  elements  of  truth  contained  in  deism  and  rational- 
ism are  these,  that  God  is  a  personal  Being,  and  that,  as 
the  Creator  of  the  world,  he  must  be  conceived  as  separate 
from  it ;  further,  that  his  interposition  in  the  world  is  not 
of  an  arbitrary  character  calculated  to  disturb  its  order, 
but  avails  itself  of  the  forces  and  laws  implanted  therein  ; 
also,  that  God,  in  his  holy  patience,  even  imposes  upon 
himself  a  certain  self-limitation  in  respect  of  human  free- 
dom. These  truths,  likewise,  have  due  importance  accord- 
ed to  them  in  the  Holy  Scriptures.  For  the  all-guiding 
and  all-watching  God  of  the  Bible,  and  none  other,  is  a 
God  of  order  (1  Cor.  14 :  33).  The  entire  history  of  his 
holy  rule  over  the  world,  as  related  to  us  in  Scripture,  is  a 
proof  of  this.  But  this  order  not  only  does  not  render 
the  Providence  of  God  in  individual  cases  superfluous, 
but  directly  requires  it.  Again,  even  when  deism  goes  too 
far  in  exalting  God  above  the  world,  in  order  not  to  de- 
grade him  by  mixing  him  up  with  the  finite  and  with  the 
changes  and  chances  of  the  world,  this  idea  contains  a 
twofold  element  of  truth:  first,  the  separation  of  God  from 
all  that  is  impure,  his  holiness  and  i7icomparahleness  ;  and 
next,  his  eternal  immutahiUty  and  constant  conformity 
with  himself.  But  what  can  set  forth  these  attributes 
of  God  more  prominently  than  do  the  Scriptures  ?  Ac- 
cording to  them,  God  is  in  his  inmost  nature  the  only  holy 
One^  who,  being  strictly  severed  from  all  that  is  impure, 
and  unaffected  by  any  of  the  infirmities  of  finite  beings,  is 
supernaturally  exalted  above  all  their  limitations.  He  is 
purity  itself,  and  keeps  far  from  him  everything  that  is 


36  THE  BREMEN  LECTURES 

opposed  to  his  nature  (Lev.  11 :  44,  45,  19  :  2  ;  Ps.  22 : 4; 
Isa.  6  :  3,  64 :  5 ;  John  17 ;  11 ;  Rev.  15  : 4),  because  he  is 
the  incomparable  One  (Isa.  40  :  25,  46  :  5).  And  so,  too, 
he  is  the  immutable  One.  For  whereas  all  the  gods  of 
polytheistic  religions  have  a  history  full  of  personal  events, 
changes,  metamorphoses,  and  adventures,  and  the  sacred  | 
writings  of  the  heathen  are  mere  collections  of  divine  biog- 
raphies, the  God  of  the  Bible  has  no  biography  and  no  per- 
sonal adventures  whatever ;  he  is  ever  and  unchangeably 
the  same,  because  he  is  the  only  veritable  self-existent  Being^ 
and  not  a  being  brought  into  existence.  His  peculiar  na- 
ture also  defines  his  relation  to  the  world,  —  "I  am  that  I 
am;"  "Thou  art  the  same "  (Ps.  102 :  27) ;  «I  am  the 
Lord  ;  I  change  not"  (Mai.  3:6);  "  With  whom  is  no  va- 
riableness "  (James  1:17;  cf.  Heb.  13  :  8). 

Thus,  in  the  Biblico-Christian  conception  of  God,  all  the 
separate  sparks  of  truth  are  concentrated,  as  it  were,  in  a 
focus.  It  combines  God's  personality  and  independence,  his 
connection  with  nature  and  capability  of  being  known,  his 
omnipresence  and  omnipotence,  his  invisibility,  incompa- 
rableness,  and  immutability,  his  supramundane,  and  yet  in- 
tramundane  existence  ;  and,  we  may  also  add,  everything 
which  reason  and  conscience  can,  by  means  of  natural 
knowledge,  unveil  of  God's  omnipotence,  goodness,  wis- 
dom, and  holiness  —  indeed,  even  all  the  true  elements 
which  are  contained  in  the  heathen  conceptions  of  God, 
of  his  miracles  and  manifestations,  his  inspirations  and  in- 
carnations. If  one-sidedly  maintained,  these  several  ele- 
ments of  truth  lead  to  a  distorted  and  mistaken  view  of 
God ;  but  if  united,  each  one  checJcs  any  undue  prom- 
inence of  the  other,  and  so  all  contribute  towards  the 
perfect  truth,  rationality,  and  beauty  of  the  Biblical  idea 
of  God. 


THE  BIBLICAL  CONCEPTION    OP  GOD  37 

Allow  me  to  set  this  before  you  more  in  detail. 

(a)  The  intrinsic  truth  of  the  Biblical  conception  of 
God  is  shown  by  the  fact  that  it  alone  affords  the  possi- 
bility of  conceiving  God  as  the  entirely  perfect^  the  truly 
absolute  Being.  No  conception  of  God  can  be  the  true 
one  which  does  not  include  every  perfection.  But  in  all 
the  other  ideas  of  God  there  is  something  essential  want- 
ing ;  at  one  time  his  spirituality  (materialism),  or  even  his 
existence  (atheism),  so  again  his  consciousness  (panthe- 
ism), or  his  constant  living  activity  (deism).  From  the 
Biblical  point  of  view,  however,  God  is  made  to  possess  all 
these  attributes,  and  to  possess  them  in  the  very  highest 
degree  —  being  and  life,  spirituality  and  omnipotence,  con- 
sciousness and  thought,  will  and  freedom,  and,  in  addition, 
a  constant  living  and  holy  activity  in  the  entire  universe. 
Here  alone  he  possesses  both  himself  and  the  world,  and  is 
absolutely  the  Lord,  who  rules  everything  according  to  his 
holy  aims,  and  guides  free  spirits  according  to  free  moral 
laws ;  here  alone  does  he  possess  every  physical  and  moral 
perfection,  and  become  "  God^"^  that  is,  entirely  and  thor- 
oughly good,  as  our  Teutonic  speech  strikingly  points  out. 
Therefore  in  this  view  only  is  the  conception  of  the  Abso- 
lute completely  realized.  For  God  must  needs  determine 
and  condition  everything.  But  for  this  end  it  is  necessary 
that  he  should  be  absolutely  good  and  absolutely  free. 
The  two  attributes  are  combined  only  in  the  God  of  Scrip- 
tures, —  the  holy,  and  therefore  also  the  free,  God,  who 
does  what  pleases  him,  whose  will  no  one  can  gainsay 
(Rom.  9 :  19)  ;  whereas  the  God  of  pantheism  is  neither 
good  nor  free,  and  the  God  of  deism  is,  at  all  events,  not 
free,  and  in  reality  not  perfectly  good. 

Moreover,  the  true  principle  of  all  being  can  evidently 
be  only  \h2Xfrom  which  everything  that  is  may  be  derived. 


38  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

Apart  from  the  moral  sphere,  God  must  be  the  unity  of 
all  antitheses.  This  he  is  only  according  to  the  Christian 
conception,  because  this  alone  makes  him  truly  absolute. 
We  can  trace  back  to  the  almighty  One  all  that  is  created, 
to  the  living  One  all  that  lives,  to  the  self-conscious  Spirit 
all  the  spiritually  rational  and  personal  life  in  the  world. 
Here  we  see  God  as  one,  and  yet  containing  in  himself  the 
principle  of  multiplicity;  pervading  everything,  and  yet 
above  all ;  capable  of  being  known,  and  yet  unsearchable ; 
condescending  to  the  lowest  depths,  and  yet  enthroned 
in  unattainable  sublimity;  eternally  near,  and  yet  eternally 
far  off. 

Again,  must  not  that  be  the  truest  idea  of  God  which 
affords  the  deepest  satisfaction  to  the  religious  need  of 
man  ?  Such  need  tends  to  a  complete  union  of  the  God- 
seeking  soul  with  the  Creator,  and  to  its  being  pervaded, 
filled,  and  blessed  by  him.  This,  according  to  Scripture, 
is  the  aim  and  conclusion  of  the  whole  revelation  and 
world-government  of  God  and  Christ,  "  that  God  may  be 
all  in  all  "  (1  Cor.  15  :  28).  Once  more,  we  must  aver  that 
this  consummation  of  the  world's  development  is  unat- 
tainable except  under  the  presupposition  of  the  Biblical 
idea  of  God.  Neither  the  impersonal  mundane  soul  of 
pantheism,  which  destroys  the  higher  self-conscious  life  as 
soon  as  it  takes  it  back  again  into  itself,  nor  yet  the  deisti- 
cal  God  who  abides  outside  the  life  of  the  world,  and  there- 
fore does  not  communicate  himself  to  individual  souls,  car 
ever  be  "  all  in  all,"  and  thus  fully  satisfy  the  religious  need 
of  man.  Only  the  God  of  Scripture  can  do  this.  And 
why  ?  Because  he  is  the  perfect  Spirit  and  perfect  love^ 
or,  combining  both  attributes  in  one,  the  Father. 

Here  we  have  before  us  the  most  profound  definitions 
of  Scripture  as  to  the  nature  of  God,jt?er  se  definitions  to 


THE   BIBLICAL   CONCEPTION   OF  GOD  39 

the  sublimity  of  which  the  presentiments  and  longings  of 
no  heathen  people  ever  rose,  although  the  truth  of  them 
directly  forces  itself  on  the  reason  and  conscience.  God 
is  spirit  (Jno.  4  :  24,  not  "  a  spirit ").  Man  has  spirit,  God 
is  spirit.  In  him  the  spirit  does  not  form  merely  a  portion 
of  his  being,  but  the  whole  substance  of  his  nature,  his 
peculiar  self,  is  spirit.  Here  we  have  the  idea  of  God  in 
his  inner  perfection^  just  as  the  names  Elohim  and  Jehovah 
tell  us  mainly  his  external  position.  As  spirit,  God  is 
the  eternal,  self-dependent  brightness  and  truth,  absolute 
knowledge,  the  intelligent  principle  of  all  forces,  whose 
glance  penetrates  into  everything,  and  produces  light  and 
truth  in  all  directions.  Spirit !  how  much  food  for  thought 
does  this  one  word  give !  Do  we  not  feel  as  though  it  would 
cut  asunder  the  hard  knot  which  philosophy  has  placed  be- 
fore us  with  its  conceptions  of  God,  so  laboriously  wrought 
out,  so  artificially  combined,  and  therefore  often  so  difficult 
to  understand  ?  "  God  is  spirit."  Placing  these  simple 
words  side  by  side  with  all  the  definitions  of  ancient  and 
modern  philosophers,  —  e.  g.,  that  God  is  the  universal  rel- 
ative measure  of  the  world's  becoming  (Heraclitus),  or  the 
indifiference  of  the  real  and  ideal  (Schelling),  &c.,  —  have 
we  not  even  in  the  profound  simplicity  of  the  Biblical 
doctrine  a  proof  of  its  truth  ?  The  greatest  truths  are 
always  those  very  ones  which  are  the  most  surprisingly 
simple  in  their  nature,  whilst  that  which  is  artificial,  con- 
torted, and  complicated,  is  in  most  cases  only  half  true  or 
entirely  false. 

How  clear  and  intelligible,  too,  do  all  the  other  attributes 
ascribed  to  God  in  Scripture  become,  when  considered  in 
the  light  of  this  fundamental  definition  of  spirituality! 
When  once  I  know  that  God  is  spirit,  I  can  much  more 
readily  conceive  that  he  is  the  eternally  living  and  personal 


40  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

One,  and  I  can  even  forecast  that  this  spiritual  nature  of 
fire  and  light  may  be  the  basis  of  his  omnipresence,  om- 
niscience, and  omnisapience,  as  well  as  of  his  omnipotence 
and  glory.  Nay,  I  can  more  readily  comprehend  those 
attributes,  for  it  is  only  as  spirit  that  they  can  appertain 
to  him.  And  conversely,  where  once  the  point  is  settled 
that  he,  as  the  most  perfect  Being,  must  possess  all  these, 
it  follows  that  he  must  be  spirit.  This  definition,  there- 
fore, is  not  merely  a  truths  hut  a  necessity^  which  sponta- 
neously results  from  the  conception  of  the  Absolute. 

The  same  is  made  clear  to  us  in  the  fundamental  tenet 
of  Scripture  as  to  the  moral  nature  of  God,  viz.,  that  he 
is  holy  love.  As  spirituality  is  the  vital  foundation  of  his 
physical  and  intellectual  perfections,  so  holy  love  is  the 
internal  basis  of  his  moral  perfections,  and  a  necessary 
deduction  from  the  true  idea  of  the  Absolute.  Benign, 
gracious,  merciful,  long-suffering,  patient,  faithful,  true,  just, 
and  whatever  other  moral  beauty  may  be  ascribed  to  God 
in  the  Scriptures,  all  this  he  can  be  only  because  he  is 
holy  (cf  the  passages  above  quoted),  and  because  he  is 
love  (1  John  4 : 8,  16).  For  the  same  reason  he  is  also 
lights  in  which  there  is  no  darkness  at  all  (1  John  1 : 5). 
Light  is  only  the  necessary  effulgence  of  his  intrinsically 
holy  nature;  for  the  moral  and  the  natural  are  in  God  in- 
dividually one.  Truly  has  one  said,  "  Holiness  is  the  hid- 
den glory,  and  glory  the  manifested  holiness  of  God."  As 
holy  love,  God  has  two  attributes :  He  is  distinctly  sep- 
arated^  as  we  have  seen,  from  all  that  is  either  internally 
or  externally  impure  and  base  (the  fundamental  concep- 
tion of  holiness),  and  is  therefore  higher,  more  glorious, 
and  more  majestic  than  any  creature;  at  the  same  time, 
he  is  full  of  the  most  tender  condescension  and  —  if  I  may 
60  say  —  self-sacrifice;   in  infinite  compassion  imparting 


THE  BIBLICAL   CONCEPTION   OF  GOD  41 

himself  to  the  world  in  order  to  eradicate  from  it  sin  and 
all  impurity,  and  to  render  it  a  partaker  in  his  perfect  life 
and  glory.  "  I  am  the  Lord  thy  God,"  he  exclaims  to  his 
people,  "the  holy  One  of  Israel,  thy  Saviour''''  (Isa.  43  :  3, 
45  :  15,  54 :  5  ;  John  3:16;  1  Tim.  4  :  10),  &c. 

What  teaching  about  God  can  be  more  sublime  or  more 
adapted  to  the  yearnings  of  our  heart  than  this  ?  Where 
do  we  find  an  idea  of  God  which  satisfies  our  religious 
need  so  abundantly  as  the  truth  that  God  is  love  ?  Does 
not  every  heart  led  by  an  involuntary  bias  say  "  yea  and 
amen  "  to  this  ?  Does  not  this  idea  force  itself  directly  as 
the  truth  upon  all,  even  unbelievers  ?  Any  man  who,  even 
in  the  smallest  degree,  acknowledges  his  deepest  need,  will 
lay  hold  on  this  truth  with  both  hands,  and  cry  out,  "  Yea, 
this  is  God ;  and  he  must  be  this,  not  merely  on  his  own 
behalf,  on  behalf  of  his  moral  perfection  and  beauty,  but 
for  my  sake  also,  if  there  is  to  be  any  hope  for  me ;  the 
God  of  love  is  the  only  God  who  can  satisfy  my  needs." 

No  less  comforting  is  the  name  of  Father^  as  applied  to 
God ;  and  following  from  the  twofold  conception  of  spirit 
and  love,  God  is  thus  called,  sometimes  in  his  character  of 
universal  originator  (e.  g.,  1  Cor.  8  :  6),  sometimes  in  the 
special  sense  of  begetting,  as  in  the  case  of  Christ  (e.  g., 
Ps.  2  :  7),  and  the  regenerate  (e.  g.,  Jas.  1:18),  but  specially 
because  he  exercises  loving  care,  education,  and  providence. 
The  former  universal  relationship  is  the  groundwork  of  the 
latter  more  special  one.  This,  however,  we  do  not  find  only 
in  the  New  Testament,  but  also  in  the  Old  (Deut.  32  :  6 ; 
Ps.  103  :  13;  Isa.  63  :  16,  64 : 8;  Jer.  3 : 4, 19,  31 : 9;  Mai.  1 : 6, 
2  :  10)  ;  although,  it  is  true,  the  true  depths  of  the  divine 
Fatherhood  are  first  revealed  to  us  in  the  former,  because 
the  relation  of  God  to  men  as  Father  was  perfectly  realized 
in  Christ  alone,  and  through  him  was  brought  about  for  the 


42  THE  BREMEN  LECTURES 

whole  world.  This  name  points  out  his  dignity  no  less  than 
his  accessibility  and  condescension,  his  holy  prefiguration 
of  us  no  less  than  his  love  and  care,  our  own  needy  condi- 
tion no  less  than  our  honor  and  dignity,  as  children  cre- 
ated in  our  Father's  image.  What  an  encouragement  and 
stimulus  for  a  human  heart,  —  how  much  that  excites  con- 
fidence, imposes  awe,  stimulates  the  conscience,  and  inspires 
love  and  hope,  —  what  a  sea  of  joy  and  bliss  there  is  in  that 
one  name  Father  !  "  All  our  other  knowledge  of  God  con- 
tains nothing  more  than  the  isolated  letters  and  syllables 
of  this  one  Name"  (Tholuck).  We  Christians  possess  it 
and  enjoy  it  in  its  fullest  extent.  In  the  whole  range  of 
heathen  piety  we  find  nothing  but  distant  and  obscure  pre- 
sentiments of  the  heart's-joy  which  overwhelms  each  one 
who,  in  the  fullness  of  his  soul,  can  cry,  "  Doubtless  thou 
art  our  Father  and  Redeemer;  from  everlasting  this  is  thy 
name  "  (Isa.  63 :  16)  ;  who  can  call  upon  his  God  by  all  the 
glorious  names  which  the  Scriptures  apply  to  him,  —  Phy- 
sician, Stronghold,  Rock  of  Salvation,  Refuge  and  Confi- 
dence, Shield  and  Buckler,  Light  and  Consolation,  Shepherd 
and  Helper,  Redeemer  and  Saviour. 

Again,  I  ask,  is  there  any  idea  of  God  which  can  more 
thoroughly  satisfy  the  religious  need  of  a  human  heart  ? 
Indeed,  in  view  of  this  name  of  God,  I  will  venture  to  ask 
every  one  who  rejects  the  Biblical  idea  of  him.  Hast  thou 
ever  earnestly  considered  its  depths,  in  devout  contempla- 
tion and  active  appropriation,  without  finding  full  satisfac- 
tion in  it?  Only  we  must  never  forget  that  the  truth  of 
the  Biblical  idea  of  God  must  be  recognized  principally 
by  personal  experience.  The  true  God  must  be  found  by 
a  moral  search.  "  The  desire  to  attain  to  God,  without 
God,"  says  a  philosopher,  "is  just  such  another  feat  as  the 
tempter  promised  to  teach  our  first  parents :  how,  in  oppo- 


THE   BIBLICAL   CONCEPTION   OP   GOD  43 

sition  to  God,  and  without  him,  they  might  make  them- 
selves equal  to  him  "  (Baader). 

Or  must  not  that  be  the  true  idea  of  God  by  which  I,  as 
a  sinful  being,  am  at  once  bowed  down  and  raised  up  ^ 
by  which  I  am  made  to  feel  the  whole  weight  of  my  guilt, 
and  yet  not  to  despair,  but  to  hope ;  by  which  I  am  shown 
the  wide  gulf  which  separates  me  from  God,  and  also  the 
way  to  a  restoration  of  unity  with  him  ?  And  what  else 
in  this  respect  can  compare  with  the  God  of  the  Holy 
Scriptures,  who  in  one  breath  says  of  himself,  "  I  dwell  in 
the  high  and  holy  place,  and  with  him  who  is  of  a  contrite 
and  humble  spirit"  (Isa.  57:15;  comp.  Ps.  117:5-7),  so 
as  to  make  us  feel  at  once  his  holy  distance  and  his  com- 
forting nearness?  or  again,  who,  whilst  asking  sin-burdened 
Israel  whether  he  ought  not  justly  to  make  them  like  unto 
Sodom,  immediately  adds,  "Mine  heart  is  turned  within 
me;  my  repentings  are  kindled  together"  (Hos.  11 :  8)  ? 
And  where  shall  we  find  the  way  to  a  restoration  of  union 
with  God  brought  so  lovingly  before  the  fallen  world  as 
by  him  who  proclaims,  "  God  so  loved  the  world  that  he 
gave  his  only-begotten  Son,  that  whosoever  believeth  in 
him  should  not  perish^  but  have  everlasting  life'*''  f 

And  finally,  must  not  that  be  the  true  idea  of  God  which 
does  the  most  to  elevate  man  morally,  to  ennoble,  to  spiritu- 
alize him,  and  to  render  him  like  God  ?  And  from  an  his- 
torical point  of  view  we  ask.  Where  has  there  been  any 
conception  of  God  and  religion  which  has  so  much  elevated, 
educated,  and  enlightened  both  individuals  and  nations  as 
the  Biblico-Christian  conception  ?  Whence  may  we  expect 
a  more  powerful  moral  influence  than  from  the  worship  of 
the  God  who,  as  spirit,  desires  to  be  worshipped  only  in 
spirit  and  in  truth  ?  Where  is  there  a  more  forcible  stim- 
ulus to  purity,  both  of  heart  and  life,  than  is  found  in  the 


44  THE  BREMEN  LECTURES 

worship  of  him  of  whom  it  is  written,  "  Holy,  holy,  holy, 
Lord  God  of  Sabaoth ; "  and,  "  Be  ye  holy,  for  I  am  holy  "  ? 
And  place  side  by  side  the  fact,  that  other  nations,  who 
were  acquainted  with  none  but  unholy  gods,  have,  through 
their  worship,  sunk  into  an  ever-deepening  moral  degrada- 
tion, which  could  not  be  averted  even  through  the  influ- 
ence of  philosophy.  "  By  their  fruits  ye  shall  know  them." 
And  indeed  the  truth  of  this  conception  of  God  is  wit- 
nessed not  merely  by  the  Holy  Scriptures,  but  also  by  our 
own  heart  and  conscience,  and  the  testimony  of  innumerable 
Christians,  who  have  recognized  it  in  their  personal  expe- 
rience, and  have  given  incontestable  evidence  of  its  moral 
fruits  in  their  hearts  and  lives ;  and  the  whole  history  of 
the  world  and  its  civilization  confirms  it. 

(J)  Nor  does  reason  itself  bear  a  less  decided  witness 
in  favor  of  this  view.  Some  one,  perhaps,  will  say,  "  It  is 
all  very  well  to  heap  together  the  greatest  possible  number 
of  beautiful  attributes ;  but  the  question  is,  whether  it  is 
rational  to  predict  all  these  together  of  God  ?  Yes,  I  reply, 
the  Biblical  conception  of  God  is  also  the  most  rational^ 
and  the  one  that  recommends  itself  most  strongly  to  our 
understanding.  It  is  true  that  his  sublimities  far  transcend 
all  the  perceptions  of  reason.  But  they  are  not  unreason- 
able  because  they  are  beyond  the  scope  of  reason.  Nc 
reasonable  man  can  expect  that  he  as  a  finite  being  should 
entirely  and  perfectly  comprehend  the  infinite  God ;  to  do 
this,  he  must  himself  be  God.  And  it  is  therefore  perfect- 
ly comprehensible  to  any  discreet,  temperate  mind,  which 
remains  conscious  of  its  limitations,  that  the  Scriptures 
should  reserve  the  perfect  knowledge  of  God  for  the  intui- 
tion of  another  life  (1  Cor.  13 :  12 ;  2  Cor.  5 : 7 ;  1  John  3 ;  2). 
The  only  question  therefore  is,  whether  this  preliminary 
knowledge  of  God  with  which  the  Holy  Scriptures  furnish 


THE   BIBLICAL   CONCEPTION   OF   GOD  45 

US,  on  the  express  understanding  of  its  fragmentary  nature, 
really  recommends  itself  to  our  reason,  and  not  merely  to 
our  hearts.  And  this  it  does  infinitely  more  than  any  other 
conception. 

Is  it  not,  I  ask  in  the  first  place,  the  most  reasonable 
thing  we  can  do  to  adopt  that  idea  of  God  which  renders 
the  necessary  divine  perfections,  and  also  the  mystery  of 
the  world  and  our  own  being,  more  intelligible  than  does 
any  other?  Our  conception  of  God  fulfils  all  these  require- 
ments. We  have  already  seen  that  the  attributes  of  eter- 
nal vitality  and  personality,  of  omnipresence,  omniscience, 
omnipotence,  &c.,  which  we  are  bound  to  attribute  to  the 
Absolute  as  such,  are  unintelligible,  unless  with  the  Bible 
we  presuppose  God  to  be  spirit.  Moreover,  it  is  no  longer 
a  mystery  to  me  that  God  should  create  worlds,  notwith- 
standing the  perfect  self-suflSciency  of  his  being,  if  I  know 
that  he  is  Love,  whose  nature  it  is  to  desire  that  other 
beings  outside  itself  should  rejoice  in  their  existence.  It 
is  no  longer  a  matter  of  wonder  to  me  that,  in  every  grain 
of  dust  and  in  every  drop  of  water,  traces  of  infinite  wis- 
dom obtrude  themselves  on  ray  notice,  when  I  think  of 
God  as  the  highest  self-conscious  Intelliojence.  I  am  no 
longer  at  a  loss  to  account  for  the  requirements  of  a  law 
in  my  conscience  which  is  altogether  different  from  that 
which  rules  in  nature,  when  I  know  that  the  holy  God  is 
thereby  teaching  me  his  holy  will.  Again,  it  appears  to 
me  in  the  highest  degree  reasonable  that  God  should  reveal 
himself  in  the  Scriptures  step  by  step,  gradually  disclosing 
to  man  the  depths  of  his  own  nature :  first  his  power,  good- 
ness, and  wisdom  ;  then  his  holiness  and  justice  ;  and  last 
of  all,  in  Christ,  his  world-subduing  love.  So  soon  as  I 
form  the  idea  that  he  is  a  Father  who  is  educating  man,  I 
see  why  he  communicates  himself  to  him  in  a  special  man- 


46  THE  BREMEN  LECTURES 

ner  during  childhood,  and  then  places  the  earlier  periods 
of  man's  existence  under  a  law  somewhat  different  from 
that  which  rules  the  later  ones.  Yes,  in  view  of  the  moral 
freedom  of  man,  it  no  longer  seems  inexplicable  that  God 
should  have  allowed  him  to  sin,  and  thereby  to  bring  such 
unutterable  woes  upon  our  race,  if  I  can  believe  that  the 
purpose  and  counsel  of  God  from  all  eternity  was  to  re- 
deem man  through  Christ,  and  to  bring  him  back  into 
blessed  fellowship  with  himself  It  no  longer  seems  a 
strange  chance  that,  in  the  course  of  the  world's  history, 
I  should  perceive  so  many  traces  of  righteous  justice  and 
holy  laws  never  to  be  infringed  with  impunity,  when  I 
know  that  a  righteous  God  is  in  the  seat  of  government, 
guiding  everything  according  to  his  holy  purposes.  Nay, 
do  not  the  mysteries  of  my  own  life's  experience  become 
closer  and  clearer  when  I  illumine  them  with  the  utterance, 
"  I  have  loved  thee  with  an  everlasting  love ;  therefore 
with  loving-kindness  have  I  drawn  thee  "  (Jer.  31 :  3) ; 
that  is,  with  the  belief  in  God  as  a  Father,  who  in  every- 
thing, be  it  love  or  be  it  severity,  seeks  to  draw  me  to  him- 
self? The  inmost  yearning  of  my  soul  after  God  becomes 
intelligible  to  me,  and  is  satisfied  in  its  profoundest  depths, 
only  when  I  know  that  God  in  his  compassion  meets  me 
half  way  and  imparts  himself  to  me,  because  he  is  love. 

Once  more  I  ask.  Is  it  not  consonant  with  reason  to  ac- 
cept an  idea  of  God  which  furnishes  me  with  a  hey  to  the 
most  important  questions  connected  with  the  world  and 
with  my  life  ?  If  the  other  conceptions  of  God  lead  me 
to  only  an  inexplicable  something^  at  which  my  thoughts 
are  at  rest;  and  if,  on  the  other  hand,  the  Biblical  concep- 
tion of  God  affords  me,  in  respect  to  the  ultimate  cause  of 
things,  at  least  a  notion,  the  substance  of  which  I  can  in 
Bome  measure  comprehend,  and  which  —  even  in  practical 


THE   BIBLICAL   CONCEPTION   OF   GOD  47 

life  —  solves  many  enigmas  which  must  else  remain  un- 
solved ;  then  surely  the  rationality  of  this  conception  of 
God  must  be  greater  than  that  of  all  others,  and  the  words 
hold  good,  "  The  fear  of  the  Lord,"  that  is,  the  theoretical 
and  practical  observance  of  this  idea,  "  is  the  beginning 
of  wisdom." 

(c)  Finally,  the  Biblical  conception  of  God  recommends 
itself  by  its  beauty  no  less  than  in  other  ways ;  for  in  this 
respect,  too,  it  far  surpasses  all  other  cognate  ideas.  For 
the  most  part  it  would  be  hard  to  discover  an  aspect  of 
beauty  in  the  non-Biblical  conceptions  of  God.  Philosoph- 
ical definitions  of  the  divine  nature  may  tickle  our  intel- 
lectual palate ;  but  abstract  ideas  of  this  kind  will  not 
touch  our  sense  of  beauty.  And  yet  the  God  who  formed 
the  world,  as  a  beautiful  expression  of  his  own  mind  (Gen. 
1 :  31),  and  then  made  it  over  to  man  as  his  beautiful  image, 
to  impress  upon  it  the  divine  brightness  of  his  Spirit,  and 
glorify  it  into  his  own  likeness,  —  surely  this  God  who  is 
the  most  perfect  Being  must  also  be  the  most  beautiful, 
and  must,  therefore,  most  forcibly  arouse  and  attract  to 
himself  the  sense  of  beauty  felt  by  his  image  —  man. 
Both  in  his  physical,  his  intellectual,  and  moral  attributes, 
the  Gt)d  of  the  Holy  Scriptures  is  a  God  of  surpassing  beau- 
ty. Not,  indeed,  his  formless  and  invisible  essence,  but  his 
overt  action  and  self-manifestation,  especially  in  Christ,  have 
for  this  reason  at  all  times  been  an  inexhaustible  mine  of 
wealth  for  representative  art,  and  have  inspired  it  to  its 
sublimest  and  most  ideal  productions. 

Let  us  just  for  a  moment  compare  the  other  conceptions 
of  God  with  that  of  the  Bible  in  point  of  beauty.  In  the 
one  case  we  have  an  unconscious  mundane  soul,  whose 
rule,  in  a  moral  point  of  view,  is  no  better  than  that  of 
animal  instinct ;  in  the  other,  a  self-conscj.ous,  holy,  all-wise 


48  THE  BREMEN  LECTURES 

intelligence :  in  the  one  case,  a  universal  substance  under 
the  iron  law  of  necessity,  first  begetting  a  world,  and  then 
again  swallowing  it  up ;  in  the  other,  a  free,  creative  will 
which,  in  love  to  men,  places  itself  in  relation  to  them  as 
free  beings  according  to  the  moral  laws  :  or  again,  in  the 
one  case,  a  Being  who  was  once  a  Creator,  but  now  rests 
in  slothful  inactivity,  not  troubling  himself  about  his  crea-; 
tures  individually ;  in  the  other,  a  Father  who  "  openeth' 
his  hand  and  fiUeth  all  things  living  with  plenteousness," 
who  also  "clothes  the  lilies  and  the  grass  of  the  field," 
and  "feeds  the  fowls  of  the  air : "  in  the  one  case,  a  mere 
indifferent  looker-on,  who  leaves  the  world  entirely  to 
itself,  or  at  best  observes  it  from  some  astronomical  dis- 
tance; in  the  other,  "  One  who  keepeth  Israel,  and  neither 
slumbereth  nor  sleepeth,"  and  guideth  his  people  like  a 
faithful  shepherd.  Listen,  on  the  one  hand,  to  a  Lalande, 
who  presumptuously  exclaims,  "  For  sixty  years  I  have 
surveyed  the  heavens,  and  never  as  yet  have  I  seen  -S?m/" 
or  to  a  La  Place,  who  says,  "  In  my  heaven  I  can  find  no 
God ; "  and  hear,  on  the  other,  the  king  of  Israel,  who,  in 
holy  awe,  ejaculates,  "  Whither  shall  I  flee  from  thy  pres- 
ence ?  "  "  Behold,  the  heaven  of  heavens  cannot  contain 
thee  : "  listen,  on  the  one  hand,  to  a  Hegel,  who  looks  upon 
the  starry  world  as  nothing  better  than  "  a  luminous  erup- 
tion, no  more  worthy  of  wonder  than  an  eruption  in  man, 
or  a  swarm  of  flies ; "  and,  on  the  other,  to  the  pious 
psalmist,  to  whom  "the  heavens  declare  the  glory  of  God." 
Compare,  I  pray  you,  these  antagonistic  views  of  God  and 
the  world,  and  then  tell  me  candidly  which  is  the  more 
beautiful,  the  sublimer,  the  more  worthy  of  God  and  man  ! 
On  this  point,  however,  the  objection  is  very  frequently 
raised,  that,  side  by  side  with  many  exalted  ideas  of  God, 
there  are  in  the  Bible,  at  least  in  the  Old  Testament, 


THE  BIBLICAL  CONCEPTION   OF  GOD  49 

many  views  unioortliy  of  him.  This  widely  spread  notion 
is  in  innumerable  cases  not  merely  a  main  item,  but  also 
the  source  of  modern  doubts  as  to  the  Christian  faith. 
The  objections  most  commonly  urged  are  to  the  nature 
and  mode  of  God's  intercourse  with  man,  as  represented 
in  the  Old  Testament  Scriptures,  —  to  his  too  human-like 
appearances  and  feelings,  his  wrath,  vengeance,  repentance, 
and  the  like.  In  the  consideration  of  these  stumbling- 
blocks,!  would  simply  recommend  you  to  keep  in  view  two 
things  :  firsts  the  gradual  progress  of  revelation,  in  which 
God  must  educate  mankind  (Deut.  8  :  5),  dealing  therefore 
with  them  at  first  as  children^  and  condescending  to  them 
in  a  way  different  from  his  bearing  towards  men ;  and, 
second^  the  circumstance  that  God  himself  and  the  instru- 
ments of  his  manifestation,  such  as  the  angels  in  the  case 
of  Abraham  and  of  Jacob,  are  not  to  he  considered  as  abso- 
lutely identical.  In  this  way,  very  many  of  the  situations 
which  are  supposed  to  be  unworthy  of  God  lose  their  seem- 
ingly offensive  character.  Furthermore  it  must  be  borne 
in  mind  that  a  certain  distinction  exists  between  the  aven- 
ging Judge  of  the  Old  Covenant  and  the  God  of  mercy  and 
love  of  the  New  Covenant.  Not  that  God  alters  in  his 
nature ;  he  ever  was  and  is  unalterably  holy  in  all  his  ac- 
tions. But  times  and  men  certainly  do  alter.  Hence  in 
God's  educatory  dealings  with  men,  everything  has  its 
wisely  prescribed  season.  The  truth,  that  God  is  love, 
could  not  be  revealed  in  its  full  depth,  until  the  law,  by 
its  penalties,  had  brought  about  the  consciousness  of  sin 
and  a  longing  for  entire  release  from  it. 

Having  thus  endeavored  to  vindicate  briefly  before  the 
forum  of  modern  consciousness  the  eternal  truth  of  the 
general  conception  of  God  —  that  is,  of  his  personality  and 
special  providence  —  as  laid  down  in  the  Bible,  we  still 


50  THE  BREMEN  LECTURES 

feel  that  we  have  accomplished  only  the  easier  portion  of 
our  task.  For  the  number  of  those  who  reject  the  general 
system  of  Biblical  theism  is,  on  the  whole,  far  less  than  that 
of  those  who  entertain  doubts  as  to  the  specific  Christian, 
that  is,  the  Trinitarian  conception  of  God.  We  must  there- 
fore yet  give  at  least  some  consideration  to  this. 

II.   The  Trinitarian  Conception  of  the  Divine 
Nature. 

In  the  so-called  Apostles'  Creed  (as  also  in  the  Nicene), 
the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  is  simply  a  confession  of  per- 
sonal faith  in  God  the  Father,  in  Jesus  Christ  his  only- 
begotten  Son,  and  in  the  Holy  Spirit.  In  the  creed  of 
Athanasius  (likewise  so  called),  which,  in  addition  to  the 
Apostles'  and  Nicene,  is  generally  received  in  all  divisions, 
Protestant  as  well  as  Roman  Catholic,  of  the  Western 
church,  we  have  this  doctrine  as  formulated  in  the  school 
of  Augustine  in  a  much  more  developed  shape.  "  The 
Catholic  faith^^  according  to  that  formula,  "  is,  that  we 
worship  one  God  in  Trinity,  and  Trinity  in  Unity,  neither 
confounding  the  Persons  nor  dividing  the  substance^  The 
persons,  it  proceeds  to  teach,  are  different ;  the  substance 
one.  Each  of  these  divine  persons  is  uncreate,  each  is 
eternal,  each  almighty,  &c.  And  yet  there  are  not  three 
Almighties  or  three  Eternals,  but  one  Almighty  and  one 
Eternal,  &c. ;  and  not  three  Gods  or  three  Lords,  but  one 
Lord  and  one  God.  The  Father  is  uncreate  and  unbegot- 
ten ;  the  Son  uncreate,  but  begotten  of  the  Father ;  the 
Holy  Ghost  uncreate,  but  proceeding  from  the  Father  and 
the  Son.  And  in  this  trinity  of  divine  persons  there  is 
none  before  and  none  after,  none  higher  and  none  less, 
but  all  three  coequal. 


THE   BIBLICAL   CONCEPTION    OF  GOD  51 

This  doctrine  of  the  church  is  to-day  regarded  by  many, 
and  by  some  who  wish  to  believe  in  God,  as  a  superstition. 
We  confess,  respecting  it,  that  modern  scientific  theology, 
and,  indeed,  that  branch  of  this  theology  which  adheres 
most  closely  to  the  teaching  of  Holy  Scripture,  professes 
to  find  in  the  same  (and  I  think,  not  without  some  rea- 
son) sundry  defects.  The  symbol  is  evidently  too  stiffly 
arithmetical  in  its  definitions  and  antitheses,  without  at- 
tempt to  reconcile  its  obvious  contradictions.  It  does  not 
satisfy  the  questions  and  requirements  of  speculative  the- 
ology, neither  does  it  fully  accord  with  the  Scripture  teach- 
ings. We  will,  therefore,  endeavor  to  give  what  we  find 
to  be  the  Bible  presentation  of  this  matter. 

You  are  all  aware  that  no  such  sentence  as  God  is  a  tri- 
une God  is  to  be  found  in  our  Bible.  The  well-known  text 
(1  John  6  :  7),  "  There  are  three  that  bear  record  in  heaven, 
the  Father,  the  Word,  and  the  Holy  Ghost,  and  these  three 
are  one,"  is  now  universally  recognized  as  an  interpolation. 
The  terras  trinity^  triunity^  threefold  personality^  and  even 
the  word  person  itself,  are  not  derived  immediately  from 
Scripture.  It  fares  with  these  as  with  all  attempts  to  ex- 
press human  conceptions  respecting  the  Divine  and  Infinite 
—  they  are  but  imperfect,  inadequate  expressions  which 
we  accept  and  use  for  want  of  better.  The  very  term 
persons  has  something  objectionable  in  it,  suggesting  at 
first  the  notion  of  distinct  and  separate  individualities, 
which  is  perfectly  inapplicable  to  the  consubstantial,  and 
therefore  inseparable,  hypostases  of  which  the  Bible  speaks 
as  Father,  Son,  and  Holy  Spirit.  Our  church  formularies 
are  undoubtedly  right  in  laying  stress  on  the  unity  of  sub- 
stance in  these  divine  Persons ;  but  it  may  be  questioned 
whether  they  are  also  right  in  seeming  to  speak  of  the  di- 
vine substance  as  if  it  were,  in  the  first  instance,  something 


52  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

indefinite  and  universal,  which  was  then  resolved  into  three 
distinct  hypostases.  When  we  speak  of  "three  persons  in 
one  divine  substance,"  we  use  an  expression  which  seem- 
ingly implies  that  the  substance  is  regarded  as  something 
abstract  and  impersonal,  which  assumes  a  threefold  per- 
sonality in  the  concrete  forms  of  God  the  Father,  God  the 
Son,  and  God  the  Holy  Ghost.  But  Holy  Scripture,  and 
also  primitive  theology,  regards  the  Divine  Essence  as  in 
itself  personal,  naming  it  at  once  God  and  Father.  These 
two  sources  agree  in  speaking  of  the  heavenly  Father  as 
(not  the  first  member  of  a  series  of  divine  evolutions,  but) 
himself  God,  holding  the  fullness  of  the  Godhead  in  him- 
self, Fo7is  totius  Deitatis,  the  spring  and  fountain-head  of 
the  whole  Deity  from  which  Son  and  Holy  Ghost  are  ever- 
more derived.  This  point  is  one  of  decisive  significance 
in  determining  the  relations  between  the  divine  Persons. 

The  Trinitarian  doctrine  of  Scripture,  then,  is  briefly 
this  :  The  Father  is  simply  God,  the  God,  the  divine  sub- 
ject, the  source  and  well-spring  of  the  Godhead  of  both 
Son  and  Holy  Spirit ;  the  Son  is  God,  true  God,  in  hypo- 
static distinction,  though  derived  from  the  Father;  and 
the  Spirit  is  also  truly  God  in  a  form  which  is  predicated 
of  the  whole  divine  nature  (for  God  is  a  Spirit,  John  4  :  24, 
and  tlie  Lord  is  the  Spirit,  2  Cor.  3 :  17),  but  also  in  hypo- 
static distinction  from  the  Father  and  the  Son,  by  whom 
he  is  sent,  and  from  whom  he  proceeds.  There  is  there- 
fore at  once  the  most  essential  unity,  and  a  threefold  hypo- 
static distinction.  The  divine  nature  remains  undivided  ; 
the  whole  Godhead  (Ofcnrjc)  is  in  the  Son  and  in  the  Holy 
Spirit  —  in  the  Son  (Logos)  as  God's  own  self-utterance, 
in  the  Spirit  as  the  divine  self-consciousness.  And  as  the 
Son  is  the  uttered  thought  of  the  Father  concerning  him- 
self, BO  it  is  again  his  office  to  speak  out  into  the  world  the 


THE   BIBLICAL  CONCEPTION  OP  GOD  53 

Father's  thoughts  of  creation  and  redemption,  and  thus  to 
stand  to  the  creatures  generally,  and  especially  to  man- 
kind, in  an  original  archetypal  relation  (John  1:4).  And 
finally,  as  the  Son  is  thus  the  archetypal  and  ideal  princi- 
ple of  mediation  between  God  and  the  world,  of  creation 
and  redemption,  so  the  Holy  Spirit  is  the  real  or  efficient 
principle,  effecting  and  individualizing  all  the  creative  and 
redeeming  energies  of  the  Father  and  the  Son,  applying, 
for  instance,  to  each  individual  believer  the  justification 
ideally  (i.  e.,  in  the  idea  or  thought  of  God)  accomj^lished 
by  the  Son,  and  so  effecting  a  real  sanctification  and  regen- 
eration (Eph.  2:18;  1  Cor.  12  :  3)  :  in  which  process  he 
takes,  indeed,  everything  from  the  Son,  the  real  and  actual 
having  always  the  ideal  and  transcendent  for  its  ultimate 
ground  and  condition. 

If  now  we  look  back  on  the  various  dogmatic  statements 
in  the  Athanasian  Creed,  we  shall  find  them  confirmed  in 
essentials  by  what  we  have  given  as  the  teachings  of  Scrip- 
ture :  the  Son  and  the  Holy  Spirit  are  with  their  imma- 
nence in  the  Father  yet  distinct  persons,  and  with  their 
distinct  personality  they  continue  immanent.  Therefore, 
neither  may  we  confound  the  three  persons  nor  divide  tlie 
one  substance.  And  if  the  definitions  of  that  formulary 
go  somewhat  beyond  the  teaching  of  Scripture  and  of  the 
earlier  church,  in  the  absolute  equalization  of  the  divine 
persons  (none  before  or  after,  none  greater  or  less),  to  the 
partial  obscuration  of  the  truth  of  the  derivation  and  sub- 
ordination of  the  Son  and  Holy  Spirit  in  the  coequal  God- 
head, it  must  nevertheless  be  acknowledged  that  the  church 
possesses  and  guards  in  the  Athanasian  Creed  an  invaluable 
restraint  and  bulwark  against  speculative  errors,  whether 
of  a  tritheistic,  or  deistic,  or  pantheistic  tendency. 

At  the  same  time,  it  must  be  further  acknowledged  that 


54  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

these  definitions  and  distinctions  are  not  sufficient  to  bridge 
over  the  chasm  which  still  yawns  between  Faith  and  Rea- 
son. The  old  question  is  evermore  recurring :  How  can  the 
unity  of  one  being  or  substance  admit  of  a  threefold  self- 
consciousness  '?  How  can  there  be  one  substance  in  three 
distinct  persons,  and  with  three  distinct  personal  activities? 
Eighteen  centuries  of  toilsome  thought  have  not  succeeded 
in  solving  this  enigma.  The  most  recent  efforts  of  spec- 
ulative theology  only  make  us  feel  more  acutely  that  here 
we  stand  in  presence  of  the  mystery  of  all  mysteries,  and 
see  only  darkly  as  through  a  mirror  of  obscure  reflection. 
"  It  is  a  truth  "  (to  use  the  noble  words  of  Hilary  of  Poi- 
tiers) "which  lies  beyond  the  domain  of  hum^n  language, 
beyond  the  scope  of  sense,  beyond  the  comprehension  of 
reason.  The  archangels  know  it  not,  the  angels  understand 
it  not,  the  ages  do  not  comprehend  it,  no  prophet  has  dis- 
covered it,  no  apostle  explored  it,  the  Son  himself  has  not 
made  it  fully  known."  Divine  mysteries  cannot,  and  were 
never  intended  to  be  made  perfectly  plausible  to  human 
reason  ;  they  are,  and  must  be,  in  the  first  instance,  matters 
of  faith. 

On  the  other  hand,  it  is  no  less  certain  that  they  must 
also  present  points  of  contact  for  our  apprehension;  to  the 
believing  inquirer  it  is  given  not  only  to  accept,  but  also 
to  know^  the  mysteries  of  the  kingdom  of  heaven  (Matt. 
13  :  11).  And  this  is  the  case  with  the  fundamental  doc- 
trine of  the  holy  Trinity.  The  revelations  of  Scripture  on 
this  subject,  however  inadequate  may  be  the  forms  given 
to  them  in  the  systems  of  earlier  and  later  theology,  are 
,iOt  only  of  the  last  importance  for  our  knowledge  of  God, 
of  man,  and  of  the  universe,  but  also  present  so  many  aids 
to  fruitful  meditation,  and  are  themselves  in  so  many  ways 
confirmed  by  the  witness  of  history  and  the  soundest  results 


THE   BIBLICAL   CONCEPTION   OP   GOD  55 

of  rational  speculation,  that  only  the  most  indolent  superfi- 
ciality would  pretend  to  reject  them  unexamined.  So  much 
has  been  effected  in  our  own  day  for  the  illustration  of  this 
doctrine,  in  the  departments  of  Scriptural  exegesis  and 
philosophical  speculation,  as  well  as  in  that  of  dogmatic 
and  historical  theology,  that  we  have  already  sufficient 
grounds  of  reason  for  our  adherence  to  this  the  apostolic 
faith ;  which,  not  having  its  source  in  mere  reason,  is  above 
but  not  against  it.  Only,  he  who  would  enter  into  this  as 
into  any  other  truth,  must  have  his  standing  in  it  before  he 
can  understand.  But  whosoever,  not  in  the  carping,  one- 
sided spirit  of  mere  intellectual  exercise,  but  in  the  prac- 
tical way  of  both  moral  and  intellectual  self-surrender  to 
the  quickening  and  illuminating  influences  of  the  triune 
Godhead,  seeks  to  apprehend  this  truth  of  the  divine  na- 
ture, to  him  an  ever-widening  field  of  rational  inquiry  will 
be  revealed,  and  he  will  learn  more  and  more  to  find  in 
this  mystery  a  key  to  the  understanding  of  the  deepest 
enigmas  of  his  own  nature  and  that  of  the  world  around 
him. 

(a)  Even  the  history  of  the  principal  religions  of  the 
world  furnishes  so  many  collateral  supports  to  our  Trin- 
itarian conception  that  rise  has  been  given  to  the  assertion 
that  primeval  humanity  must  have  possessed,  in  some  shape 
or  other,  the  knowledge  of  the  triune  God,  which  thence 
was  transmitted  in  a  distorted  form  to  the  heathen  reli- 
gions. For  we  find  traces  of  it,  not  only  here  and  there, 
but  in  the  mythologies  of  all  nations.  In  any  case,  it  is 
certain  that  in  a  very  early  age  men  learned  to  look  upon 
three  as  the  perfect  number,  expressing  absolute  harmony, 
and  uniting  in  itself  beginning,  middle,  and  end.  Hence 
a  trinity  of  deities  is  common  to  all  nations.  Time  will 
not  permit  the  giving  of  instances,  but  we  will  refer,  by 


56  THE  BREMEN  LECTURES 

way  of  confirmation  to  our  remark,  to  what  has  been  said 
by  Schelling:  "The  philosophy  of  mythology  proves  that 
a  Trinity  of  Divine  Potentialities  is  the  root  from  which 
have  grown  the  religious  ideas  of  all  nations  of  any  impor- 
tance that  are  known  to  us."  As  we  confronted  atheism 
with  the  fact  noticed  even  by  the  heathen  themselves,  that 
all  nations  are  agreed  in  worshipping  some  higher  Being, 
and  as  we  can  see  that  this  fact  is  a  proof  of  our  not  being 
deceived  by  our  consciousness  of  God,  so  we  now  point 
those  who  deny  the  doctrine  of  the  Trinity  to  this  gen- 
eral agreement  of  all  nations,  as  a  proof  for  the  truth  of 
our  Christian  conception  of  God ;  while,  by  the  pre-Chr'is- 
tian  origin  of  these  mythologies,  we  are  guarded  against 
the  objection  that  these  Trinitarian  ideas  might  have  pro- 
ceeded from  the  influence  of  Christian  ideas  upon  the  hea- 
then legends. 

But  in  addition  to  this  positive  argument  in  favor  of 
Trinitarianism,  the  history  of  religions  provides  us  with  a 
no  less  important  negative  support  in  the  example  of  those 
nations  whose  creed  has  remained  an  abstract  monotheism 
—  the  Jews  and  the  Mohammedans.  Here  we  see  that  the 
mere  abstract  unity  of  the  Godhead,  which  does  not  in- 
clude a  multiplicity,  soon  leads  to  a  cold  and  lifeless  de- 
ism ;  and  as  soon  as  it  has  reached  this  point,  is  forced  to 
seek  refreshment  from  the  pantheistic  religions  of  nature. 
After  the  Jews  and  Mohammedans  had  rejected  the  idea 
of  a  Son  who  is  of  the  same  divine  essence  with  his  Father 
as  idolatry,  they  were  fated  to  find  their  absolutely  mono- 
theistic conception  of  God  utterly  empty  and  lifeless,  so  that 
they  yearned  after  the  warm  vitality  of  pantheism.  This 
is  a  phenomenon  which  is  clearly  evident  from  the  history 
of  the  Jewish  philosophers  (especially  Spinoza),  as  well  as 
of  the  Indian  and  Persian  pantheists.    And  so,  too,  it  co/ild 


THE  BIBLICAL   CONCEPTION   OF  GOD  57 

not  but  happen  that  philosophical  pantheism  should  tread 
on  the  heels  of  German  deism  and  rationalism.  If  the 
question  be  put,  How,  then,  is  Monotheism  to  be  preserved 
from  sinking  back  into  the  deification  of  nature?  the 
answer  must  be,  Only  through  belief  in  the  Trinity. 

(b)  This  brings  us  to  the  great  advantages  derived  from 
the  Trinitarian  conception,  in  respect  to  the  knowledge  of 
God  in  general,  and  his  relation  to  the  world  and  to  man. 
We  have  already  remarked,  that  the  fullness  of  God's  being 
cannot  be  contained  in  an  abstract  Unity,  and  yet  that  his 
absolute  personality  must  have  unity  for  its  fundamental 
attribute.  Here  we  find  both  of  these  in  vital  interpenetra- 
tion.  God  is  One,  it  is  true,  but  at  the  same  ti*ne  he  is  the 
Living  One,  the  organic  fullness  of  power  and  love,  and 
thus  alone  is  the  conception  of  a  truly  living  God  actually 
realized.  Furthermore,  the  conception  of  the  triune  God 
furnishes  us  with  the  sole  bridge  that  can  fill  up  the  breach 
between  God  and  the  world.  None  but  this  can  fill  up  the 
void  which  separates  the  transcendent  unity  of  God  from 
the  rich  and  manifold  organization  of  natural  life.  Here 
we  see  the  possibility  of  the  world's  creation  by  the  pre- 
mundane  Word  of  God  and  his  Spirit,  whose  work  it  is  to 
realize  the  divine  thoughts.  Here,  first  of  all,  we  have  a 
connecting  link  between  God  and  man  in  the  person  of  the 
Incarnate  Logos,  who  is  the  eternal  Archetype  of  the  whole 
creation,  and  especially  of  man,  and  who,  for  all  future  aeons, 
will  be  the  head  of  the  whole  body.  Here,  too,  the  spiritual 
chasm  which  yawns  between  sinful  man  and  the  absolutely 
sinless  God-man,  is  filled  up  by  the  regenerating  and  sanc- 
tifying influences  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  Hence  the  doctrine 
of  the  Trinity  aflbrds  the  most  important  aids  in  determin- 
ing onv practical  relation  to  God.  To  elaborate  no  further, 
this  doctrine  is  the  consummation  and  the  only  perfect 


58  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

protection  of  theism.  There  can  be  no  true  theism  with- 
out the  Trinity.  The  one  absohite  Personality  as  such  can 
be  only  the  Triune  God.  Trinitarianism  is  not  less  true  and 
necessary  than  theism ;  and  what  we  adduced  as  proofs  for 
the  latter  are  mediate  arguments  for  the  former  also. 

(c)  Still  further,  speculative  theology  provides  us  with 
many  collateral  arguments  in  favor  of  the  truth  and  the 
intrinsic  necessity  of  the  Trinitarian  doctrine.  Nitzsch, 
for  instance,  remarks  that  the  Divine  Ego,  in  order  to  have 
a  really  living  personality,  must  not  only  view  its  second 
other  self  as  an  object,  but  also  revert  to  itself  by  a  further 
act  as  a  third  subject,  as  that  it  comprehends  its  alter  ego 
as  the  real  image  of  itself.  "  If  God  be  conceived  as  the 
primal  Ego,  and  from  this  basis  begets  an  objective  alter 
JEgo^  this  thesis  and  antithesis  still  remain  several  or  in- 
complete until  a  third  Ego  proceeds  from  the  Divine 
essence  through  the  medium  of  the  second,  and  thus  the 
personality  is  fully  consummated."  So  also  Sartorius : 
"God  is  love  — personal,  primal  love.  What  can  he  more 
delight  to  say  than  'My  Beloved'?  God  is  the  Father, 
the  eternal  Father.  What  is  the  Father's  eternal  and 
dearest  Word  other  than  Son,  beloved  Son  (Matt.  3  :  17)  ? 
Through  the  eternal  Son,  God  is  the  eternal  Father,  the 
eternally  loving  and  eternally  loved  One;  the  eternal  I 
and  the  eternal  Thou,  as  Christ  addresses  his  Father  in 
loving  converse  (John  17 :  24).  And  this  love  is  as  ready 
to  impart  itself,  as  perfect  and  as  great  as  God  whose  es- 
sence it  is ;  and  therefore  the  Son  is  not  less  than  the 
Father,  nor  does  he  differ  from  him  either  in  essence  or  in 
origin.  How  small  would  be  the  Fatherhood,  were  the 
Son  but  half  God !  We  must  distinguish  between  the 
love  which  begets  the  Son  and  that  which  blesses  him,  — 
the  love  of  the  well-pleased  Father,  and  again,  the  answer- 


THE  BIBLICAL  CONCEPTION   OP  GOD  59 

iiig  love  on  the  Son's  part.  The  breath  of  that  blessing 
and  answering  love  is  the  Spirit.  But  were  he  only 
breath,  and  not  a  person,  the  glorification  of  the  Father 
and  Son  through  the  Spirit  would  be  egoistical.  This 
egoistical  element  is  removed  only  if  the  Spirit  who  glo- 
rifies the  Father  and  the  Son  is  himself  a  person."  Sim- 
ilarly has  Delitzsch  recently  attempted  to  reconcile  the 
Trinitarian  passages  of  Scripture  with  the  idea  of  God  as 
contained  in  our  reason.  But  in  all  such  attempts,  care 
must  be  taken  not  to  make  that  which  is  naturally  difi5- 
cult  unintelligible,  and  at  most  they  are  only  attempts  at 
explanation,  not  full  and  perfect  explanations. 

{d)  Another  and  more  obvious  series  of  collateral  sup- 
ports for  the  doctrine  we  are  discussing  may  be  found  in  a 
consideration  of  God's  image  as  reflected  in  our  own  hu- 
man nature^  and  in  creation  generally.  For  if  God  be 
indeed  Trinity  in  Unity,  then  there  is  every  reason  to  sup- 
pose that  the  works  of  his  hands  should,  in  some  degree  at 
least,  reflect  his  nature,  and  especially  that  man,  who  is  cre- 
ated in  the  image  of  God,  should  evince  in  his  nature  cer- 
tain analogies  which  indicate  a  triune  Creator.  And  what 
an  abundance  of  such  indications  meets  our  eye !  Chris- 
tian thinkers,  even  in  olden  times,  discovered  traces  of  the 
Trinity  in  the  life  of  the  human  spirit ;  and  hence  Augus- 
tine and  others  speak  of  a  human  trinity,  consisting  in  the 
threefold  function  of  feeling,  thought,  and  will.  And,  in- 
deed, these  principal  faculties  of  the  spirit  —  presenting 
us,  as  it  were,  with  a  threefold  cord,  the  threads  of  which 
are  distinct,  and  yet  one  —  do  give  us  some  idea  of  the 
united  and  harmonious  co-operation  of  the  three  Divine 
Persons.  As  the  three  functions  of  the  soul  may  be  dis- 
tinguished, but  not  separated,  so  with  the  three  Persons 
who  form  the  one  Divine  Being.     In  like  manner,  the 


60  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

process  of  our  thought  will  explain  in  some  degree  the  pre- 
existence  of  the  Son  as  the  Logos  or  Word  of  the  Father. 
In  our  human  consciousness  a  certain  thought  always  simul- 
taneously produces  the  corresponding  word ;  we  can  only 
think  in  conceptions  and  words,  for  our  thought  is  inward 
speech.  So,  too,  God's  thought  of  himself  necessitates 
the  utterance  of  the  Word  which  represents  the  primal 
Thought ;  but  the  divine  utterance  is  at  the  same  time  a 
real  act,  and  hence  this  inner  Word  in  God  is  a  Being  equal 
to  Him.  A  similar  argument  for  the  personality  of  the 
Spirit  may  be  drawn  from  our  religious  consciousness. 
Faith  tells  us  that  the  Spirit  is  giving  us  true  personality 
in  the  sight  of  God,  and  that  without  the  Spirit  we  cannot 
in  any  way  attain  to  full,  firm.  Godlike  personality.  But 
that  which  tends  to  promote  true  personality  cannot  in 
itself  be  impersonal.  As  in  the  human  spirit,  so  also  in 
the  outward  world  of  nature^  there  are  certain  indications 
and  reflections  of  the  Trinity.  We  constantly  see  one  life 
in  various  members.  In  the  one  sun  we  see  light  and 
warmth  as  different,  and  yet  intermingling  and  co-operating 
forces.  We  have  the  one  space  divided  into  three  dimen- 
sions of  length,  breadth,  and  height ;  time,  similarly,  into 
past,  present,  and  future  ;  all  bodies  into  solid,  liquid,  and 
gaseous.  What  remarkable  analogies  are  shown,  e.  g.,  by 
the  laws  of  color  and  of  light !  The  three  fundamental 
colors,  red,  yellow,  and  blue,  dissolve  into  the  unity  of  white 
light,  so  that  an  English  naturalist  (C.  Woodward)  might 
well  call  this  white  light  a  trinity  in  unity.  But  they  co- 
alesce in  such  a  manner,  "  that  each  of  the  three  rays  pre- 
serves its  distinctive  attribute.  Red  is  the  caloric,  yellow 
the  luminous,  blue  the  chemical  (active)  ray."  God  is 
Light;  and,  verily,  natural  light,  the  first  of  his  creatures, 
bears  the  immediate  impress  of  his  triune  being.     No  less 


THE   BIBLICAL   CONCEPTION    OF   GOD  61 

does  the  number  three  govern  the  arrangement  of  nature's 
forces ;  and  indeed  so  abundant  everywhere  in  the  world 
are  the  illustrations  of  the  idea  of  the  Trinity,  that  this 
idea  may  rightfully  be  said  to  be  omnipresent. 

(e)  And  no  wonder  that  philosophy  also  —  and  this  not 
only  the  old  mystic  theosophical  speculation,  but  also  mod- 
ern idealism,  with  all  the  acuteness  of  its  dialectics  —  has 
taken  up  the  idea  of  a  triune  God,  and  endeavored  to  com- 
prehend and  to  prove  it.  True,  such  attempt  has  often 
ended  in  proving  the  truth  of  an  utterance  once  made  by 
a  profound  divine  with  respect  to  the  doctrine  of  the  Trin- 
ity, and  which  I  would  beg  my  readers  to  lay  to  heart :  "  If 
we  go  too  deeply,  and  yet  not  deeply  enough,  into  this  mat- 
ter, we  shall  be  blinded  by  this  sun."  Modern  philosophy 
(from  Jacob  Bohme  onwards)  has  shown  that  it  feels  the 
idea  of  the  Trinity  to  be  the  solution  of  the  world's  enig- 
ma. Hegel  called  this  idea  "the  pivot  of  the  world." 
Schelling,  in  his  Philosophy  of  Revelation,^  approaches  on 
this  subject  very  closely  to  the  Christian  view.  Still  more 
closely  come  Baader  and  J.  H.  Fichte.  These  instances 
will  suffice  to  make  us  comprehend  what  a  philosopher 
(Braniss)  some  years  ago  most  truly  remarked :  "  The  con- 
ceptions of  speculative  philosophy^  where  they  are  most 
profound,  come  nearest  to  the  Christian  doctrine;  nor 
need  we  be  anxious  lest  speculative  philosophy  should 
ever  reach  a  height  from  which  it  may  look  down  and 
say  that  the  Christian  element  is  left  behind.  I^o  thought 
can  transcend  the  Christian  idea,  for  it  is  truth  in  itself." 

Thus  we  are  from  all  quarters  referred  to  the  conception 
of  the  Trinity;  and  should  we  ever  be  tempted  to  sacrifice 
the  Trinity  to  the  Unity,  it  will  be  well  to  remember  that 

1  Philosophic  der  Offenbarung'. 


62  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

the  Scriptural  and  Christian  idea  of  God  is  justified  and 
proved,  as  far  as  a  mystery  can  be,  by  history  and  science, 
by  nature  and  philosophy.  We  may  apply  to  the  doctrine 
of  the  Tiinity  the  beautiful  words  uttered  by  Vinet,  when 
speaking  of  love :  "  It  is  a  mystery,  the  greatest  of  all  mys- 
teries, and  the  key  of  all  mysteries,  but  itself  has  no  key." 
The  collateral  arguments  which  we  have  adduced,  while 
by  no  means  keys  that  can  fully  open  this  mystery,  yet 
show  that  the  idea  of  the  Trinity  is  really  the  hey  to  the 
comprehension  of  the  nltimate  world-enigmas ;  of  the 
world's  eternal  pre-condition  in  God ;  of  its  creation,  re- 
demption, and  consummation.  Without  this  doctrine, 
Scripture  is  to  us  a  sealed  book ;  without  it,  we  ourselves 
and  the  world's  history  are  a  dark  riddle.  True,  this  is  a 
problem,  the  rational  solution  of  which  in  this  life  is,  and 
must  remain,  mere  patchwork ;  but  even  this  patchwork  is 
far  deeper  and  more  valuable  for  our  knowledge  as  a  whole 
(to  say  nothing  of  our  practical  religion)  than  all  that  the 
cheap  wisdom  of  the  street  can  bring  forward  in  objection. 
And  so,  too,  the  very  struggle  to  solve  this  problem,  even 
though  it  should  be  without  results,  is  of  infinitely  greater 
value  than  the  ready  rejection  which  we  so  often  hear  from 
the  intellectual  slothfulness  of  unbelief.  If  it  is  true  that 
the  darker  the  revelation  the  greater  is  the  reward,  both 
for  faith  and  knowledge,  which  awaits  those  who  gradually 
penetrate  into  it,  then  just  because  the  doctrine  of  the 
Trinity  is  the  most  obscure  and  enigmatic  revelation  of 
God,  the  profoundest  depths  of  knowledge  will  be  opened 
to  him  who  with  earnest  searchings  penetrates  into  this 
revelation,  and  to  him  what  is  seemingly  self-contradictory 
will  appear  more  and  more  in  grand  harmony  and  intrinsic 
necessity.  At  first  it  appears  to  be  quite  contrary  to  rea- 
son, afterwards  reason  is  more  and  more  in  favor  of  it,  and 


THE   BIBLICAL  CONCEPTION   OF  GOD  63 

finally  it  cannot  give  it  up — it  becomes  indispensable  for 
her  entire  knowledge  of  God  and  the  world. 

Just  the  contrary  is  the  case  with  the  false,  non-Biblical 
conceptions  of  God.  At  first  they  please  our  reason,  and 
look  as  if  they  could  give  a  simple  solution  of  all  enigmas. 
But  the  more  deeply  reason  goes  to  work  with  them,  the 
less  satisfactory  do  they  become ;  the  more  do  enigmas, 
obscurities,  ay,  contradictions  appear,  till  at  length  it  is 
evident  that  the  whole  fabric  rests  on  unproven  and  un- 
tenable assumptions,  and  that  those  conceptions  really  give 
none  of  the  explanations  which  they  at  first  promised. 
Our  mind,  then,  is  expressed  in  the  words  of  Joshua,  the  son 
of  Nun  :  "  Choose  you  this  day  whom  ye  will  serve ;  .  . 
but  as  for  me,  and  my  house,  we  will  serve  the  Lord." 


LECTURE   II 

THE  DOCTRINE  OF  CREATION   AND 
NATURAL  SCIENCE 

By  OTTO  ZOCKLER,  D.  D. 

PROFESSOR  AT  GREIFSWALD 


OTTO   Z(;CKLER,  I).  D. 


BIOGEAPHIOAL 


Otto  Zockler,  ph.  d.,  d.  d.,  was  born  at  Griinberg,  in  Hesse, 
May  27, 1833.  He  studied  at  Giessen,  Erlangen,  and  Berlin.  In 
1857  he  became  privat-docent  at  Giessen,  and  professor  extraor- 
dinary at  the  same  place  in  1863.  In  1866  he  was  made  ordinary 
professor  at  Greifswald,  and  in  January,  1885,  he  became  con- 
sistorialrath.  Besides  being  editor  of  the  Allgemeine  literarische 
Anzeiger  fur  das  Ev.  Deutschland  (1867-74),  he  also  edited  (since 
1882)  the  journal  founded  by  Hengstenberg,  the  Uv.  Kirchen- 
zeitung.  Besides,  he  has  been  since  1866  principal  editor  of 
Der  Beweis  des  Glaubens.  In  Dr.  Lange's  great  Bibelicerk,  Dr. 
Zockler  wTote  the  commentaries  on  Chronicles,  Job,  Proverbs, 
Ecclesiastes,  Canticles,  and  Daniel.  He  has  been  a  voluminous 
author.  Among  his  more  important  works  are  his  Urgeschichte 
der  Erde  und  des  Menschen,  and  his  Das  Kreuz  Christi ;  the  lat- 
ter of  which  has  been  translated  into  English.  His  studies 
all  along  the  line  of  the  natural  sciences  fitted  him  peculiarly 
well  for  treating  successfully  the  subject  discussed  by  him  in 
this  volume. 


SUMMAEY  OF  LECTUEE  U 


The  biblical  conception  of  God  is  in  these  times  assailed  at 
no  point  more  frequently  than  with  respect  to  the  doctrine  of 
creation — Particularly  is  there  opposition  to  this  doctrine  as 
found  in  the  Old  Testament — Exceptions  are  taken  to  the  al- 
leged narrowness  of  the  0.  T.  monotheism,  to  the  six  successive 
days  of  creation,  and  to  the  instantaneousness  of  the  creative 
processes — True  relation  between  faith  and  knowledge — Unbe- 
lieving science  and  superstition — Unbelieving  science  and  skep- 
ticism— Illustrations  of  mistaken  doubt  as  connected  with  geo- 
graphical observations  and  discoveries — The  same  as  connected 
with  facts  of  modern  astronomy — Also  with  facts  of  meteorology, 
physics,  and  technology — Other  illustrations  as  connected  with 
the  science  of  organic  nature,  botany,  zoology,  and  human  phys- 
iology, also  with  animal  magnetism  or  psycho-physics — A  lesson 
to  be  drawn  from  these  mistakes  of  an  obdurate  unbelief,  is  that 
skepticism  is  only  the  reverse  side  of  scientific  superstition — An- 
other lesson  is  that  many  departments  of  physics  are  as  yet  too 
immature  to  furnish  reliable  conclusions — Recent  origin  and  a 
running  history  of  Geology — The  Lyellian  quietism  is  the  only 
antagonist  with  which  the  biblical  account  has  now  to  do — This 
question  is  disproved  (1)  by  the  difference  in  principle  between 
creation  and  preservation — Disproved  also  (2)  by  incidental  cir- 
cumstances affecting  present  geological  changes — Likewise  (3) 
by  the  existence  in  times  past  of  forces  not  now  recognizable, 
that  contributed  to  hastening  the  processes  of  the  earth's  forma- 
tion— Also  (4)  by  the  probability  that  during  the  time  of  the 
earth's  formation  a  higher  temperature  obtained  than  at  pres- 
ent— Finally  (5)  the  recent  date  of  the  oldest  historic  traditions 
is  against  this  Lyellian  doctrine — Harmony  existing  between 
natural  science  and  the  Mosaic  record— Doctrine  of  the  last 
things  as  in  the  Bible  and  as  taught  by  unbelieving  science. 


n 


THE  DOCTRINE   OF  CREATION,  AND  NATURAL 
SCIENCE. 

BY    OTXO    ZOCKLER,    3D.  r>., 

PROFESSOR     AT     GREIFSWALD 

/'^fc^HERE  is  no  point  at  which  the  Biblical  conception 
// I  \  of  God  is  assailed  more  frequently,  in  these  times, 
\^^/   than  it  is  respecting  the  doctrine  of  creation ;  or, 
that  God,  in  the  exercise  of  his  own  free  will,  his 
goodness  and  power,  created  the  world.     True,  much  of 
what  the  Sacred  Scriptures  teach  relative  to  God's  personal 
existence,  his  working  and  ruling,  is,  even  by  the  skeptical 
schools  of  science,  admitted  to  be  sufficiently  correct ;  but 
that  the  entire  sum  of  material  and  of  spu'itual  being  con- 
stituting what  may  be  regarded  as  the  world,  was  actually 
created  by  him, —  to    this  the   strongest    exceptions    are 
taken.     In  particular  there  has  been  of  late  need  of  vindi- 
cating the  form  in  which  the  doctrine  is  found  in  the  Old 
Testament  wi'itings. 

The  fault  of  this  is  not  so  much  any  defect  in  the  Old 
Testament  representation  of  creation,  as  it  is  rather  the 
inability  of  its  opponents  correctly  to  judge  of  and  to  under- 
stand it.     Exception  is  taken  to  what  is  termed  the  nar- 

69 


70  THE    BREMEN   LECTURES 

rowness  of  the  Old  Testament  monotheism  ;  consisting,  as 
is  asserted,  in  the  particular  that  God's  all-powerful  word, 
his  repeated  fiat,  '.'  Let  there  be  !  "  is  represented  as  having 
called  all  the  individual  creations  into  being.  But  those 
who  make  this  objection  forget  that  the  New  Testament 
also,  from  which  they  would  like,  if  possible,  to  obtain  a 
more  modernized  conception  of  creation,  partakes  of  this 
same  rigidly  monotheistic  idea,  nay,  it  intensifies  and  de- 
velops this  very  feature.  For  the  New  Testament  teaches, 
most  unequivocally,  not  only  that  God  is  the  author  of  all 
things  (see  Rom.  11:36,  1  Cor.  8:6),  but  also  that  he 
created  the  world  out  of  nothing,  existence  out  of  non- 
existence (Heb.  11:3,  comp.  Rom.  4:17),  and,  as  the  sole 
intermediate  agency  in  the  work  of  creation,  it  names  no 
order  of  mere  creature,  neither  a  material  energy  nor  a 
supernatural  potency,  but  exclusively  the  Eternal  Son  of 
God,  the  personal  Word,  of  one  substance  with  the  Father, 
and  so  really,  in  a  concrete  personal  form,  that  creative  "  Let 
there  be "  of  the  first  of  Genesis  (comp.  John  1:3,1  Cor. 
8  :  6,  Col.  1 :  15-18,  Heb.  1  :  2,  etc.) — Again,  exception  is 
taken  to  the  alleged  childishness  of  the  Old  Testament 
account,  that  it  divides  the  creation  into  six  successive  days 
of  labor,  and  then  makes  to  follow  these,  as  the  prototype 
of  our  legal  human  Sabbath,  a  day  of  rest  for  the  Creator. 
To  this  objection,  as  well  as  to  the  other,  it  may  be  replied, 
that  it  rests,  in  part  at  least,  upon  misapprehension.  For 
the  New  Testament  adheres  just  as  firmly  to  this  weekly 
division  of  the  creation,  as  it  does  to  the  doctrine  that  all 
things  were  made  by  the  Word  of  God  (comp.  John  5:17, 
Heb.  4:4  seq.).  Besides,  it  is  just  this  specialty  of  the 
days  which  reveals  to  an  attentive  examination  an  aston- 
ishing harmony  between  the  revelations  of  Scripture  and 
the  aflarmations  of  modern  physics,  relative  to  a  gradual 


THE   DOCTRINE   OP   CREATION  71 

progress  in  the  formation  of  the  world,  from  the  lowest 
order  of  being  up  to  man. — Lastly,  exception  is  taken  to 
the  immediateness  and  instantaneousness  of  the  world's 
production,  to  the  scantiness  of  time  allotted  by  the  Bibli- 
cal history  to  the  processes  of  creation.  The  opinion  is 
entertained  that  we  are  indebted  to  the  more  recent  science 
for  a  conception  of  the  formation  of  matter,  an  idea  of  the 
development  of  organic  existence  from  the  lowest  up  to  the 
highest  species,  in  comparison  with  which  all  the  old  theo- 
ries of  a  creation  must  inevitably  be  put  to  confusion,  as 
the  products  of  unscientific  thinking  or  of  a  dreamy,  misty 
mythology.  The  advocates  of  this  view  intrench  them- 
selves behind  such  commonplaces  as  :  "  the  hypothesis  of  a 
creation,  in  the  exact  sense  of  the  word,  is  the  source  of 
many  scientific  errors  ; "  or,  "  for  the  conception  of  a  crea- 
tion, let  there  be  substituted  the  scientifically  more  correct 
one  of  a  development ; "  or,  "  the  power  required  of  the 
pan-spirit,  i.  e.,  nature,  to  create  the  world  is  not  different 
from  that  required  to  uphold  and  govern  it,"  and  the  like. 
But  here,  again,  it  is  not  remembered  that  the  end  at  which 
such  a  view  of  the  world,  a  view  which  in  fact  eliminates 
the  idea  of  a  creation,  must  unavoidably  arrive,  can  be 
nothing  short  of  a  gloomy  materialism,  deifying  matter,  and 
a  theory  of  sensuousness  directly  opposed  to  every  princi- 
ple of  correct  moral  teaching  and  living ;  that,  moreover, 
the  scientific  result  of  such  a  one-sided,  sensuous-empirical 
philosophy,  defying  all  logic,  can  never  be  more  than  a  very 
ambiguous  one ;  and  that,  in  general,  all  knowledge  dis- 
ioined  from  faith,  and  adhering  exclusively  to  the  phenom- 
enal and  temporal,  must  be  considered  incorrect  ani 
unreliable  in  principle,  and,  though  qualified,  perhaps,  lo 
solve  the  simple  problems  appertaining  to  man's  earthly 
interests  and  his  ordinary  daily  life,  can  never  be  deemed 


72  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

competent  to  decide  those  great  questions  which  go  to  the 
first  causes  of  things  and  to  our  ultimate  destiny. 

But,  "  In  all  the  conflicts  heretofore  between  faith  and 
knowledge,  faith  has  been  invariably  worsted,"  —  tnus  are 
we  saluted,  in  the  words  of  a  celebrated  jurist  and  cory- 
phaeus of  natural  science.  As  finely,  however,  as  the 
phrase  may  sound  in  the  ears  of  many,  we  are  able  to  dis- 
cern in  it  not  a  particle  of  truth ;  it  starts  from  an 
altogether  erroneous  idea,  not  only  of  faith,  but  equall}^  so 
of  knowledge.  For  that  faith  which  has,  at  any  time  or  in 
any  place,  been  overcome  by  science,  with  which  it  was  in 
conflict,  did  not  deserve  to  be  called  faith,  but  only  a  super- 
stition or  a  delusion.  And,  on  the  other  hand,  that  science 
which  should  assault  a  true  and  genuine  faith  maliciously, 
and  apparently,  for  a  time,  triumph  over  it,  would  not  de- 
serve to  be  called  science,  but  only  a  perversion  of  science, 
or  an  impertinent  short-lived  sciolism.  Faith  and  science 
are  only  two  roads,  diflering  in  direction,  not  in  aim,  to  one 
and  the  same  objective  truth.  True  faith  and  actual  knowl- 
edge, so  far  from  being  contradictory,  always  demand  and 
supplement  each  other.  For  faith,  as  the  immediate  appre- 
hension of  the  truth  by  the  divinely  illuminated  reason,  is 
related  to  knowledge,  regarded  as  the  acquired  apprehen- 
sion of  the  same  truth  by  the  reason  struggling  towards 
such  knowledge,  as  the  necessary  condition,  the  starting- 
point  and  support  of  all  its  operations.  All  faith  is  unde- 
veloped knowledge,  and  all  knowledge  is  faith  unfolded  and 
applied  to  the  different  reahns  of  reason  and  experience. 
Had  it  not  been  for  the  faith  of  Columbus,  he  would  never 
have  discovered  the  New  World ;  and  as  little,  without 
faith,  would  Copernicus,  Kepler,  and  Newton  have  made 
their  discoveries  in  the  material  heavens.  Zoologists,  such 
as   i.iiinaeus  and  Cuvier ;  phj^siologists,  like  Blumenbach, 


THE   DOCTRINE   OP   CREATION  78 

John  Miiller,  and  R.  Wagner  ;  and  chemists  of  the  rank  of 
Lavoisier  and  Liebig,  would  never  have  made  the  epochs 
which  were  made  by  them  in  their  respective  departments, 
had  they  not  been  guided  by  the  star  of  faith.  The  true 
pioneers  and  promoters  of  natural  science,  and  of  all  the 
other  departments  of  knowledge,  have  almost  invariably 
been  men  of  faith.^  Even  Darwin  would  have  been  unable 
to  achieve  whatever  of  real  significancy  there  is  in  his 
development  theory,  had  it  not  been  for  that  remnant  of 
belief  in  a  living,  personal  Deity,  which  he  evinces  where 
he  speaks  of  the  origin  of  the  different  organic  species.  It 
is  only  the  thoroughly  materialistic  disciples  of  the  great 
inquii-er,  on  this  and  on  the  other  side  of  the  Channel,  who 
have  criticised  him  for  this  belief  in  a  personal  God,  as  the 
creator  of  the  first  few  forms  of  vegetable  and  animal 
being,  styling  it  a  '^  lamentable  inconsistency,"  a  peculiar 
"  narrowness  in  matters  of  faith ; "  and,  by  setting  aside 
this  remnant  of  a  theistic  method  of  conception,  they  have 
given  to  Darwinism  its  present  decidedly  pantheistic  form.^ 
A  science  which  thus,  out  of  pure  hostility,  assails  belief 
in  the  Divine  Being  and  in  Divine  Revelation,  in  order  to 
leave  nothing  standing  as  fact  but  the  results  of  a  wholly 
sensuous  empiricism,  does  not  deserve  the  name  of  science. 
It  is  at  best  but  a  half-way  knowledge,  inasmuch  as  it 
leaves  out  of  view  the  entire  realm  of  spiritual  existence, 
all  that  belongs  to  the  unseen  world.  Its  innermost  essence 
is  unbelief,  a  denying  on  principle  of  everything  not  sensu- 
ous ;  although  it  can  never  be  total  unbelief,  but  will  always 

1  Compare  Mallet's  remark :  "  It  is  delightful  to  see  how  such  heroes  of  science 
as  Copernicus  and  Kepler,  as  Baco  de  Verulam,  Newton,  Haller,  Buckland,  etc. 
bow  in  the  lowest  reverence  before  Revelation,  whilst  the  light  troops  file  by  with 
out  so  much  as  removing  their  hats." 

2  Comp.  Grau,  "  Charles  Darwin  und  August  Schleicher,"  in  vindication  of  faitu 
(1866),  p.  163  ff. 


74  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

contain,  be  it  in  the  form  of  the  superstitious  or  of  the 
skeptical,  many  remnants  of  faith  in  the  supernatural. 
For  these  two  intellectual  processes,  skeptici,§m  and  super- 
stition, form,  as  it  were,  the  intercommunicating  conduits 
by  means  of  which  the  ruins  of  a  dead  and  unserviceable 
faith  are  slowly  carried  off  to  the  bog  of  a  completed  infidel- 
ity. Skepticism  and  superstition  are  the  inseparably  joined 
forerunners  or  preliminary  stages  of  positive  theoretical 
and  practical  atheism.  Of  both  these  must  that  science 
whose  ultimate  object  is  the  casting  off  of  the  hated  yoke 
of  faith,  the  proclaiming  of  unconditional  liberty  of  thought 
and  teaching,  and  the  establishing  of  absolutely  irreligious 
States,  schools,  and  families,  have  inevitably  some  admix- 
ture. From  neither  skepticism  nor  superstition  can  an 
unbelieving  science  wholly  deliver  itself. 

Certainly  not  from  superstition?  The  science  which 
concerns  itself  to  root  out  as  well  a  genuine  faith  as  a 
superstition,  often  enough  confounding  the  one  with  the 
other,  will  it  not  be  incapable  of  being  complete  mastei 
of  at  least  the  latter  enemy?  Will  it  not  be  afllicted 
always  with  the  peculiar  curse  of  falling  from  one  extreme 
into  another,  and  of  becoming  addicted  to  the  very  thing 
it  desires  most  anxiously  to  avoid?  As  paradoxical  as  it 
may  sound,  we  are  compelled  to  reply  in  the  affirmative, 
and,  to  show  the  correctness  of  this  answer,  it  will  be 
necessary  to  examine  a  little  more  closely  the  respective 
natures  and  the  mutual  relations  of  skepticism  and  super- 
vStition.  This  will  take  us  so  little  out  of  our  course,  that 
It  will  rather  open  the  direct  way  to  the  best  treatment 
of  our  theme.  For  precisely  the  theories  of  modern 
physics  regarding  the  Biblical  account  of  creation  offer 
a  stronger  admixture  of  both  these  preliminary  stages  of 


THE    DOCTRINE   OF   CREATION  75 

a  completed  infidelity,  than  can  be  found   in  almost  any 
other  department  of  nnbelievins^  inquiry. 

These  two  spiritual  tendencies,  the  skeptical  and  the 
superstitious,  have,  to  begin  with,  this  in  common:  that 
they  each  represent  a  deviation  from  true  faith,  from  the 
normal  sui-rendering  of  the  spirit  to  divine  truth.  Super- 
stition, or,  as  from  the  signification  of  the  prefix,  super,  it 
might  be  called,  oi?e?--believing,  is  that  tendency  of  spirit, 
or  method  of  thinking,  which  believes  the  superfluous.^ 
It  attempts  to  bring  within  the  domain  of  faith  and  knowl- 
edge matters  which  are  inaccesible  to  the  human  intelli- 
gence ;  and  so  commingles,  in  an  abnormal  manner,  the 
supersensuous  with  the  sensuous.^  It  is  the  stand-point 
of  belief  and  knowledge  in  harmony  with  the  heathen  my- 
thologies ;  as  also  with  idolatries  in  the  church,  —  with  the 
Romish  worship  of  saints,  Mary,  pictures  and  relics ;  the 
point  of  view  which  deifies  the  host  of  heaven,  and  hence, 
according  to  its  differences  of  species  or  of  cultivation, 
prays  to  the  sun  and  moon  as  divinities ;  interprets  every 
solar  eclipse  as  the  endeavor  of  a  giant  dragon  to  gorge 
the  sun ;  is  afraid  of  every  comet  which  appears,  as  ominous 
of  some  public  calamity ;  and  attempts  to  read  in  the 
constellations  the  destinies  of  men,  as  they  are  born  under 
this  or  that  one.  It  is  the  method  of  thought  which,  in 
times  past,  peopled  the  dens  of  mountaineers  with  all  con- 
ceivable goblins  ind  malicious  gnomes  ;  filled  the  chemists* 
laboratories  with  mysterious  tinctures,  elixirs  of  life, 
homuncuU  and  philosopher's  stones ;  caused  to  appear  on 
the  seas  of  navigators  ghost-ships,  huge  kraken,  and  the 
like  ;  and  familiarized  the  offices  and  courts  of  jurists  with 

*  Comp.  Grimin,  Deutches  Worterbuch,  under  "  Aberglaube."  Also  Hase  in  Hutt. 
rediv.  §  6,  as  well  as  the  definitions  of  superstitio  and  aberglaube  there  given.  Aa 
well.  Schleiden's  ingenious  remarks  on  the  nature  of  superstition,  in  his  "  Stii3i«  a." 
p,  200  fF.,  though  these  are  to  be  received  with  caution. 


76  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

witches,  sorcerers,  leagues  with  the  devil,  journeys  to  tJie 
Brocken,  etc.  For  its  gradual  suppression  of  these  different 
forms  of  superstition,  together  with  their  evil  practical  con- 
sequences, humanity  is  under  a  lasting  debt  of  gratitude 
to  modern  science,  —  and  especially  to  Protestant  science, 
resting  upon  evangelical  grounds, — without,  however,  on 
that  account,  being  required,  or  having  the  right,  to  deify 
it,  or  uncritically  to  accept  all  its  so-called  conclusions. 
For  only  too  frequently  has  it  happened  that  science  in 
combating  superstition  has  gone  to  the  opposite  extreme 
and  fallen  into  universal  unbelief,  or,  to  the  justifiable 
doubts  with  which  it  commenced  its  assault  upon  a  super- 
stitious view  of  the  world,  it  has  afterwards  added  an 
itching  for  denial,  a  morbid  propensity  to  criticise  and  object 
to  everything  apparently  not  in  accord  with  its  newly  ac- 
quired views.  Thus,  from  being  a  servant  of  superstition 
it  has  become  the  slave  of  skepticism  ;  and  in  this  process 
has  but  adopted  certain  forms  of  superstition.  For  if 
superstition  believes  too  much,  skepticism  does  not  believe 
enough,  and  in  adhering  to  this  incompleteness  it  shows  no 
less  obstinacy  and  narrow-mindedness  than  is  exhibited  by 
superstition  proper.  In  its  more  moderate  form,  that  is, 
of  occasional  doubt  and  critical  scrutiny  applied  to  the 
truths  accepted  by  faith,  skepticism  may  in  a  certain  sense 
be  justified ;  at  all  events,  there  are  uses  which  it  may 
subserve.  But,  as  skepticism^  that  is,  when  it  is  doubt 
developed  into  a  system,  when  it  is  essentially  only  a 
repetition,  in  all  instances,  of  the  well-known  question  of 
Pilate,  "  What  is  truth?  "  this  method  of  thought  becomes 
really  a  mental  disease,  the  last  result  of  which  will  always 
be  the  death  of  the  internal  man,  or  blank  infidelity  ;  and, 
in  its  train,  will  necessarily  appear  and  reappear  different 
forms    of    superstition,   that    abnormal    commingling   of 


THE   DOCTRINE   OP   CREATION  77 

sensuous    and   supersensuous   truths.^    A   few   examples 
taken  from  the  history  of  some  of  the  more  recent  studies 
of  nature,  will  serve  to  show  the  solidarity  existing  between 
doubt  and  superstition,  by  virtue  of  which,  as  will  appear, 
the  former  is  often  only  the  reverse  side  of  the  latter. 

We  will  commence  with  the  department  of  knowledge 
respecting  lands  and  peoples,  with  the  geographical  obser- 
vations and  discoveries,  —  a  department  which  is  the  basis' 
and  condition  of  all  advance  in  the  physical  sciences.  In 
all  this  field,  from  antiquity  down,  what  is  there  that  has 
not  been  doubted,  and  perhaps  pronounced  to  be  impossible, 
until  it  has  been  attested  by  other  investigations  than 
those  of  the  pioneers  in  geographical  science  ?  The  list 
of  skeptics,  here,  is  headed  by  Herodotus,  the  father  of 
history,  himself,  on  account  of  his  many  incredible-look- 
ing stories,  disparaged  as  credulous,  and,  much  more  un- 
justly, suspected  of  not  being  altogether  veracious.  He 
rejected  the  report  of  a  circumnavigation  of  Africa  by 
Phoenician  sailors,  in  the  employ  of  Necho,  one  of  the 
kings  of  Egypt,  for  the  very  circumstance  which  to  us  is 
strongest  in  its  confirmation,  namely,  that  the  mariners 
saw  the  sun  rise  and  set,  for  a  long  while,  "  on  their  right," 
that  is,  in  the  northern  half  of  the  heavens.^  He  is  fol- 
lowed by  the  master  of  Ancient  Geograph}^,  Strabo,  who 
aflSrmed  that  Megasthenes  and  Daimachus,  precisely  his 
most  reliable  authorities  on  India,  that  land  of  wonders 
opened  to  the  West  by  the  expedition  of  Alexander  the 
Great,    were    falsifiers,    because     their    reports    diflfered 

1  A.  Siedler,  De  Skepticismo  commentatio  (Halle,  1827).  StaudUn,  Geschichte 
und  G-eist  des  Skepticismus,  2  vols.  1794.  T.  R.  Young,  Modem  Skepticism, 
viewed  in  relation  to  Mod.  Science  (Lond.  1865). 

2  Herodot.  iv.,  42.  Comp.  on  the  other  hand,  the  familiar  sentence  found  =o  often 
in  text-books  for  beginners:  "Apud  Herodotum,  patrem  historiae,  sunt  innu- 
mersB  fabulae." 


78  THE    BREMEN   LECTURES 

materially  from  some  older  sources  which  Strabo  preferred. 
And  what  assaults  were  not  the  great  travellers  and  dis- 
coverers of  the  last  portion  of  the  middle  ages,  and  even 
of  most  recent  periods,  compelled  to  experience  from  an 
indurated  skepticism  !  "  Messer  Milione  "  ("  Mr.  Million") 
was  the  nickname  which  the  polished  Venetians,  of  the 
14th  century,  gave  as  a  carnival  joke  to  their  renowned 
countryman,  Marco  Polo,  because  he  had  stated,  that,  dur- 
ing his  journey  into  China,  he  visited  several  cities  having 
a  population  of  millions.^  And  how  fully  have  the  latest 
researches  in  China  and  in  the  islands  off  the  eastern  coast 
of  Asia  vindicated  the  reputation  of  this  traveller,  and 
confirmed,  in  part,  even  to  the  smallest  particulars,  his 
reports  !  How  far  off,  too,  is  as  yet  many  another  worthy 
explorer  of  unknown  seas  or  lands,  since  the  days  of 
Columbus,  from  receiving  like  amends,  after  having,  by  his 
own  generation  and  others  following,  been  traduced  as 
either  a  lying  reporter  or  a  most  egregiously  deceived 
observer  !  I  will  only  call  attention,  further,  to  Americus 
Vespucius  and  Fernan  Mendez  Piato,  of  the  16th  century ; 
to  Baffin,  the  discoverer  of  Baffin's  Bay  and  nearly  all  the 
seas,  coasts,  and  islands  belonging  to  North-eastern 
America,  against  whom  Sir  John  Barrow,  the  same  year  in 
which,  by  the  first  polar  expedition  of  John  Ross,  the 
statements  made  by  Baffin  two  hundred  years  before  were 
in  all  points  sustained,  opened  a  most  sweeping  and  un- 
worthy attack ;  to  the  Anglo-Indian  Himalaya  explorers, 
of  the  beginning  of  the  present  century,  e.  g.,  Colebrook, 
Hamilton,  Hodgson,  Webb,  etc.,  whose  accounts  of  the 
snow  limits  and  of  many  other  peculiarities  and  wonders 
of  that  grand  mountain  chain,  the  Himalayas,  were  so  long 
questioned  or  coolly  pionounced  to   be  impossible,  until, 

»  Strabo,  G*og  .  xv.,  1  seq.  Auf*land,  1862,  p.  335;  1863.  p.  719;  1868,  p.  934  f. 


THE   DOCTRINE   OF   CREATION  79 

by  the  reports  of  numercus  other  travellers  of  most  recent 
times,  they  were  put  beyond  the  reach  of  dispute  ;^  lastly,  to 
nearly  all  the  latest  great  explorers  of  Africa,  especially 
the  very  worthy  investigators  of  the  countries  at  the 
sources  of  the  Nile  and  in  the  south  interior  portion  of  the 
continent,  —  such  as  Krapf,  Rebmann,  Livingstone,  Bur- 
ton, Speke,  etc.  All  these  did  not  fare  much  better  under 
the  criticisms  of  certain  overwise  skeptics  and  theorists  in 
geography  than  did  the  eminent  Scotchman  Bruce,  in  the 
last  century,  whose  reports,  resting  wholly  upon  his  own 
observation,  concerning  the  natural  characteristics  and 
the  people  of  Abyssinia,  were  so  long  doubted  or  declared 
to  be  falsehoods,  until  the  most  recent  researches,  particu- 
larly those  instituted  in  connection  with  the  English  cam- 
paign of  the  past  year,  confirmed  them  throughout.  What 
Livingstone  discovered  as  to  the  identity  of  the  Leeambye 
and  Zambesi  rivers,  what  Krapf  and  Rebmann  ascertained 
relative  to  the  existence  of  a  vast  lake  in  Equatorial  East 
Africa  (the  so-called  Lake  Victoria  Nianza,  or  Lake 
Ukerwi),  —  both  were  questioned  a  long  while,  until,  by 
repeated  investigations  of  later  travellers,  they,  too,  have 
been  proven  to  be  facts.  Even  that  the  peak  of  Kiliman- 
jaro, a  mountain  from  eleven  to  twelve  thousand  feet 
high,^  is  covered  with  perpetual  snow,  the  learned  London 
geographer  Cooley  attempted  to  dispute  away  from  the 
missionaries  Krapf  and  Rebmann,  the  first  discoverers  of 
the  fact,  on  the  important  consideration  that  in  the  locality 
of  that  mountain  there  could  be  no  perpetual  snow,  that 
hence  the  missionaries  must  have  mistaken  dazzlingly 
white  quartz  or  chalk  rocks  for  snow,  —  an  opinion  which 

»  Ausland,  1866,  pp.  870  ff.  934  ff.  Petcrmann's  Gcogr.  Mittheilungen,  1867,  No. 
v.,  p.  178.    Rob.  V.  Schlagintweit,  in  Andrea's  "  Globus,"  Vol.  xii..  No.  1,  p.  2. 

2  German  measure.  The  height  given  generally  by  American  authoritifw  is  from 
18,000  to  20,000  feet.  —  Tr. 


'80  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

he  abandoned  only  when  Van  Der  Decken's  expedition  had 
ascended  Kilimanjaro  itself,  and  in  the  region  of  its  sum- 
mit found  snow  enough.^ 

Again,  what  diflSculties  and  oppositions,  caused  by  an 
Intractable  skepticism,  or  rather  dogmatism,  was  not 
modern  astronomy  necessitated  to  encounter,  in  attaining 
(ts  present  elevated  and  secure  position  I  What  disparage- 
ments did  not  the  Copernican  system  experience  from  not 
only  the  astrologico-superstitious  Tycho  De  Brahe,  but 
also  from  so  rational  and  critical  an  inquirer  as  Baco  De 
Verulam  !  How  zealously  nearly  all  the  great  physicists 
and  philosophers  of  the  last  of  the  17th  and  the  com- 
mencement of  the  18th  century,  —  as  a  Huyghens,  a 
Bernoulli,  Cassini,  Leibnitz,  nearly  all  the  disciples  of  Des 
Cartes,  etc.,  —  opposed  the  recognition  of  the  Newtonian 
system  of  gravitation  I  With  how  much  diflSculty  even  in 
our  century  did  it  obtain,  until,  taught  by  Lord  Rosse's 
gigantic  telescope  in  Ireland,  men  of  science  have  learned 
to  believe  in  the  resolvableness  of  most  of  the  so-called 
nebulae  into  innumerable,  clearly  distinguished,  separate 
stars  I  ^ 

Numerous  similar  instances  of  a  long-lived  skeptical 
resistance  on  the  part  of  scholastic  learning  to  extensive 
enlargements  of  human  acquaintance  with  nature,  are  fur- 
nished us  by  the  departments  of  meteorology,  physics,  and 
technology.  That  it  is  possible  for  stones,  in  larger  or 
smaller  masses,  to  fall  from  the  heavens,  the  wise  Academy 
of  Paris,  all  the  last  century,  deemed  to  be  a  matter  of 
doubt.     To  it  the  reports  of  showers  or    the  raining  of 

^  Aualand,  1862,  p.  333  ff. ;  1863,  pp.  667,  719  ff.  Meinecke,  in  Neumann's  Zeitachr. 
fur  allgem.  Erdk.,  1862,  p.  42  ff.    Easier  Missions-Magazin,  1861,  p.  23. 

2  Comp.  David  Brewster,  Sir  Isaac  Newton's  Lebeu,  nebst  Darstellung  seiner 
Entdeckungen,  a.  d.,  Engl,  von  Goldberg  (1833),  p.  IS"^  ff.  Also,  by  the  same  aa« 
tbor,  "More  Worlds  tban  One,"  etc.  (1854),  eh.  11. 


i'HE   DOCTRINE   OF   CREATION  81 

stones,  appeared  as  fabulous  as  the  silly  nursery  tales 
alx/Ut  the  raining  of  blood,  the  raining  of  frogs,  and  the 
like.  "What  brought  it  to  a  different  conclusion  was  that 
remarkable  fall  of  aerolites  which  occurred  near  L'Aigle, 
in  1803,  the  evidences  of  which,  while  as  yet  they  were 
entirely  fresh  and  almost  smoking,  its  commissioners  be- 
held. This  same  academy,  moreover,  for  a  long  while, 
held  that  the  phosphorescence  of  the  sea  was  a  fable  ;  and 
the  ignis  fatuus  it  pronounced  to  be  the  product  of  a  dis- 
turbed imagination.  The  splendid  microscopic  discoveries 
of  the  Netherland  naturalists,  Swammerdam  and  Leeu- 
wenhoeck,  it  attempted  to  overthrow,  a  century  after  they 
were  made,  and  to  substitute  for  them  that  axiom  of  scien- 
tific ignorance  and  indolence :  ''  One  can  generally  see 
with  the  microscope  whatever  he  imagines."  It  hindered 
the  inventors  of  the  steam  engine  and  the  electric  tele- 
graph from  introducing  their  great  achievements  into  the 
business  affairs  of  life.  And,  generall}^  by  its  skeptical 
narrow-mindedness,  it  has  opposed  the  progress  of  the 
studies  of  nature,  during  their  earlier  stages,  just  as  much 
as,  afterwards,  in  other  ways,  it  has  helped  to  further 
them.^ 

With  the  science  of  organic  nature,  botany,  zoology  and 
human  pliysiolog}^,  the  experience  has  not  been  essentially 
different.  Here,  also,  nearl}^  ever3^  valuable  discovery,  as 
certainly  as  it  revealed  anything  unusual,  or  restored  any 
item  of  knowledge  once  accepted  but  in  a  subsequent  age 
disparaged  as  a  superstition,  has  had  to  contend  with  a 
more  or  less  obstinate  skepticism,  before  attaining  general 
recognition.  Those  gold-diggers,  who  discovered  in  Ci*- 
fornia,  about  1850,  the  first  mammoth  trees  or  Welling- 

1  Humboldt,  Kosmos  I.,  p.  140.    K.  Mobius,  Das  Meerleuchten  (Hamburg,  1851), 
Aualand,  1861,  p.  839  ff. 


82  THE  BREMEN  LECTURES 

tonians,  and  described  their  colossal  height  and  thickness, 
were,  in  the  scientific  circles,  a  long  time  believed  to  be  only 
bragging,  or  practising  intentional  humbug.  The  first  billed- 
animal's  skin  that  was  brought  fi-om  New  Holland  to  Eu- 
rope, near  the  end  of  the  18th  century,  was  pronounced 
by  the  English  naturalists  of  the  time,  "  an  old  mole- 
skin fastened  to  the  jaws  of  a  duck,"  designed  to  dupe  the 
Europeans.  That  coral  is  an  animal  secretion,  the  French 
savans  of  the  last  century,  in  spite  of  all  the  evidences  to 
the  fact  furnished  by  Peysonnel  (about  1727),  disputed, 
and  continued  to  dispute  for  years,  until  at  last  the  Royal 
Society  of  London,  by  the  adoption  of  Peysonnel's  obser- 
vations in  their  Philosophical  Transactions,  gave  currency 
to  the  fact.  Exactly  so  the  fact  brought  to  light  as  early 
perhaps  as  1690,  by  Plumier,  De  La  Hire,  Geoffroy,  and 
others,  that  the  cochineal  is  not  some  sort  of  red  seed,  but 
an  insect,  was  in  many  ways  hindered  from  becoming 
recognized,  until,  finally,  the  Hollander,  Ruchscher,  in  the 
year  1729,  proved  his  assertion,  that  the  royal  dye-stuff 
was  animal  in  nature,  by  "  depositions  taken  before  a 
notary  in  Mexico  of  cochineal-growers  in  that  city,"  and 
so  won  a  large  wager.^  A  similar  reception  was  ac- 
corded to  the  observations  —  so  long  doubted,  but  eventu- 
ally confirmed  on  the  authority  of  Cuvier,  Lacepede,  and 
others  —  of  the  Danes,  Von  Daldorff  and  John,  relative  to 
a  species  of  fish  (the  Perca  Scandens  or  Anabus  Cuvieri), 
which  are  found  at  times  climbing  up  into  tall  trees,  into 
bushes,  or  up  the  sides  of  rocks,  etc. ;  also  to  the  discovery, 
made  in  the  Pacific  Ocean,  by  our  own  countryman,  Von 
Charaisso,  of  the  hanging  together  in  chain  form  of  the 
salpae  and  of  their  peculiar  alternation  of  generation,  —  a 
discovery  of  inestimable  worth  to  the  department  of  lower 

1  AuBland,  1861.  pp.  3,  415;  1862,  p.  115;  1865,  p.  20  f. 


THE    DOCTRINE   OF   CREATION  83 

zoolog}^  whicli  only  since  has  been  cultivated  with  true 
success,  nevertheless  a  discovery  which  at  first  brought  its 
author  nothing  but  ridicule  and  calumny ;  and  equally  so, 
to  tne  discovery  made  by  the  Englishman,  Hodgson,  in 
Thioet,  of  that  overlooked  species  of  antelope  (Antelope 
Hodgsonii),  remarkable  for  having  but  one  —  a  long, 
straight  —  horn,  in  which  animal  probably  may  be  recognized 
the  unicorn  of  the  ancients,  long  regarded  as  fabulous.^ 

Details  of  this  description,  possibly  still  more  numerous, 
could  be  found  in  the  physiologico-psychological  and  medic- 
inal departments.  We  will  here,  however,  refer  to  only 
three  facts :  to  Harvey's  discovery  of  the  circulation  of 
the  blood,  to  Jenner's  discovery  of  vaccination,  and  to 
Mesmer's  application  as  a  remedy  of  the  agency  known  as 
animal  magnetism,  —  three  important  enlargements  of  our 
knowledge  and  capability  in  their  respective  departments, 
which  the  immediate  contemporaries  of  their  authors  tried 
in  vain  to  doubt,  to  dispute,  and  to  explain  awa}^,  but 
which,  in  spite  of  all  the  abuses  and  misunderstandings 
experienced  by  them  at  the  first,  have,  on  the  one  hand, 
abundantly  proved  their  own  genuineness,  and,  on  the 
other,  may  be  regarded  as  the  stepping-stones  to  wide, 
epoch-making  discoveries  in  the  future,  particularly  in  the 
mysterious  realm  of  the  spiritualistic  phenomena  and  the 
ecstatic  conditions  of  human  nature.^ 

Now,  what  have  we  to  learn  from  all  these  illustrations 
of  a  wilful  skepticism?     This  remarkable  register  of  sins 

1  Ule  and  Miiller,  Die  jSTatur  (1860),  p.  364.  Gr.  Hartwig.  Gott  in  der  Natur  (Weis- 
baden,  1860),  p.  133  f,  K.  Ritter,  Erdkunde  iv.,  p.  98.  Neumann's  Zeitschr.  fur 
allgem.    Erdkunde,  1862,  II.,  p.  227. 

2  Comp.  Ulrici,  Gott  und  die  Natur,  p.  613.  Also  Stevens'  Hist,  of  the  Methodist 
Episcopal  Church  in  America  (New  York,  1865),  I.,  p.  384,  where,  allusion  being 
made  to  the  opposition  experienced  by  Harvey,  Jenner,  etc.,  the  unbelieving  atti- 
tude of  science  towards  the  same  is  characterised  as  ridiculous  "  pride  and  phari 
iu.ism.' 


84  THE    BREMEN   LECTURES 

committed  by  modern  natural  science,  —  a  record  whioh  we 
could  easily  enlarge,  nay,  so  interwoven  and  identified  with 
the  advances  and  relapses  of  natural  science,  for  the  last 
two  or  three  hundred  years,  have  been  these  offences,  that  a 
complete  history  of  them  would  not  differ  materially  from  a 
history  of  modern  physics  itself,  —  what  does  this  register  i 
of  sins  teach  us? 

In  the  first  place,  we  learn  from  it,  that  skepticism  is 
nothing  but  the  opposite  side  of  a  scientific  superstition, 
the  reflex  and  the  product  of  a  narrow  dogmatism,  which, 
in  the  propagation  and  defence  of  what  it  believes  with 
less  heartiness  than  is  characteristic  of  superstition,  is, 
nevertheless,  just  as  obstinate,  nay,  as  intolerant  as  is  su- 
perstition itself.  We  see  that  the  narrowness  of  the  stand- 
point of  these  scientific  skeptics  (or  of  these  one-sided  em- 
pirics on  scientific  ground,  as  they  might  be  called)  is 
exactly  like  that  of  the  negro  king  in  tropical  Africa,  who 
had  a  European  imprisoned  as  a  public  impostor,  because 
he  had  informed  him  that,  with  us,  water  becomes  every 
year  as  hard  as  stone,  so  that  a  person  can  walk  or  drive 
over  large  rivers  as  on  dry  ground !  We  see,  in  a  word, 
that  the  profound  theosophist  Oetinger,  the  ''  Magus  of 
the  South,"  was  right,  when  he  assailed  the  shallow  dog- 
matism of  the  skeptics  in  his  day  with  the  words :  "  There 
are  in  the  temple  of  philosophy  spurious  priests,  who  are 
like  such  youngsters  as  have  never  been  outside  of  their  own 
hamlet,  and  hence  whatever  is  told  them  of  the  curiosities 
in  foreign  lands  and  the}'  have  never  seen  at  home,  thej^  re- 
gard as  fabricated ;  the  disgrace  of  their  own  ignorance, 
however,  they  attempt  to  conceal  by  derision."*  W*^  see, 
as  well,  that  the  eminent  physician  and  poet  Albrecht  von 
Haller  characterized  correctly  this  diminutive,  short-sighted 

»  Oetinger,  Lehrtafel  der  Prinzessin  Antooie,  p.  143. 


THC   DOCTRINE   OF   CREATION  85 

Btand-poiT>t  when,  referriDg  to  the  unbelief  of  that  African 
in  the  cougealableness  of  water,  he  remarked,  with  his 
accustomed  irony  :  "  When  the  African,  from  the  unvary- 
ing experience  within  his  own  limited  circle,  decides  that 
water  is  by  nature  unchangeable,  and  when  we,  the  wise 
Europeans.,  have  decided  it  is  also  so  with  quicksilver,  that 
this  cannot  be  converted  into  a  solid,  we  have  by  the  unva- 
rying experience  of  all  men  in  all  times  ( ! )  nevertheless 
been  led  into  an  eiTor.  And  why  did  we  err?  Because, 
having  seen  many  instances,  we  decided  upon  all,  without 
having  seen  all !  "  ^ 

What  we  can  learn,  furthermore,  from  these  contributions 
to  a  history  of  the  mistakes  of  modern  science,  is  the  fact, 
that  many  departments  of  physics  are  as  yet  so  young,  so 
immature,  and  so  imperfectly  insured  as  to  their  results, 
that  no  reliable  conclusions  of  the  more  general  order,  par- 
ticularly none  which  could  be  used  for  the  overthrow  of  the 
venerable  fundamental  truths  of  faith,  can  in  any  wise  be 
deduced  from  them.  Even  so  exact  a  science  as  astron- 
omy, whose  statements  and  calculations  have,  in  unnum- 
bered instances,  partly  b}^  the  use  of  the  telescope  and 
partly  by  the  occurrence  visible  to  unassisted  vision  of 
celestial  events  at  the  moment,  nay,  at  the  very  second  pre- 
dicted, proved  their  correctness,  is  to  the  present  day  so 
far  from  having  attained  to  absolute  freedom  from  inaccu- 
racy, even  respecting  its  affirmations  relative  to  our  planet 
and  its  more  immediate  surroundings,  that,  in  spite  of  the 
rigid  investigations  of  men  like  La  Place,  Bessel,  Schubert, 
Schmidt,  and  Airy,  the  oblateness  of  the  earth  is  as  yet 


1  A.  von  Hauer,  Briefe  iiber  die  wichtigsten  "Wahrheiten  der  Offenbaruiig,  he- 
ransg.  Von  Auberlen,  p.  41.  Comp.  also  Auberlen,  Die  Gottliche  Oflfenbaruug 
B««el,  Mffl>,p  246  ff.;  and  Sohmidt,  Lineamente  zu  einem  schriftgemassen  Pro- 
•♦  '«m .  w  €y^  fgr.k  ef. <,  m  Vi^mar's  PaatoraltJiOol.    Llatttm,  vol.  v'A.  (1865)  p.  200. 


86  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

only  imperfectly  ascertained,  and  hence  quite  a  number  of 
astronomical  and  of  geographical  problems  connected  there- 
with still  await  a  truly  exact  solution.^  Still  greater  uncer- 
tainty obtains  in  chemistry  and  physics  as  to  what  has  been 
ascertained  as  yet  in  regard  to  many  of  their  fundamental 
questions.  The  modern  chemical  atomic  theory,  for  exam- 
ple, suffers  under  such  serious  difficulties  and  from  sucn 
internal  contradictions  of  a  logical  and  mathematico-phys- 
ical  nature,  that  notwithstanding  its  well-nigh  universal 
acceptance  by  the  great  chemical  authorities,  for  the  iasu 
decades  of  years,  its  speedy  displacement  by  a  wholly  dii- 
ferent  conception  of  matter,  and  of  the  forces  and  essence!^ 
lying  at  the  basis  of  matter,  can,  with  considerable  distinct- 
ness, be  foreseen.  In  physics,  the  formerly  prevailing  doc- 
trine of  the  imponderables,  or  of  substances  thought  to 
have  no  perceptible  weight,  has  only  recently  been  sup- 
planted by  the  famous  heat-hypothesis  of  the  Wiirtem- 
berger,  J.  R.  Mayer,  which,  in  its  more  developed  form  as 
the  so-called  Helmboltzian  doctrine  of  the  "  conservation 
of  force,"  makes  heat,  light,  magnetism,  electricity,  the 
chemical  forces,  sound,  and  all  mechanical  motions,  to  be 
essentially  identical  or  only  different  forms  or  varieties  of 
one  and  the  same  material  energy.  But  even  this  motion- 
theory,  the  favorite  axiom  of  a  large  number  of  scientists 
and  theorists  of  the  present  day,  is  so  far  from  being  every- 
where recognized,  that  there  are  many  distinguished  phys- 
icists who  strongly  object  to  it,  on  the  ground  of  its  nu- 
merous unexplained  difficulties.^     And  in  how  many  obscu- 

1  Comp.  Pliil.  Fischer,  Uutersuchungen  iiber  die  Gestalt  der  Erde  (Darmstadt, 
1868),  and  the  review  of  the  same  in  "  Ausland,"  1868,  p.  807  ff. 

2  Com.  Ulrici,  Gott  in  der  Natur  (2d.  Ed.)  p.  109  ff.  W.  Wundt,  Die  physikali- 
schen  Axiome  und  ihre  Beziehung  zum  Causalpriucip  (Erlangeu,  1866).  J.  Z611- 
ner,  Ueber  die  universelle  Bedeutung  der  mechanischen  Principien  (Leipz.,  1867). 
— Tyndall's  paper  before  the  British  natural  science  gathering  at  Norwich,  1868 
(for  Ausland,  1868,  p.  906). 


THE   DOCTRINE   OF   CREATION  87 

rities  Is  the  subject  of  electricity  as  yet  involved :  for 
example,  in  regard  to  the  connection  between  the  electrical 
and  the  chemical  processes  ;  in  regard  to  atmospheric  elec- 
tricity, the  cause  of  which  is  yet  "  wholly  unknown ; "  re- 
garding the  reciprocal  working  of  animal  and  of  inorganic 
electricity ;  and,  particularly,  in  regard  to  the  mysterious 
electrical  currents  which  not  only  the  electric  eel,  the  elec- 
tric silurus  and  the  torpedo,  but,  also,  in  smaller  quantities, 
the  nerves  and  muscles  of  all  other  animal  organisms  have 
the  power  of  imparting !  How  little,  for  certain,  moreover, 
does  physiological  science  —  the  domain  of  which  we  have 
touched  upon  by  this  last  reference  —  know  as  yet  of  the 
chemical  combination  and  the  action  of  animal  poisons ! 
How  much  dissension  reigned  in  it,  until  but  recently,  as  to 
whether  a  spontaneous  generation  of  organisms  (generatio 
spontanea  s.  equivoca)  was  to  be  accepted  or  not  as  fact? 
And  even  now,  how  far  from  being  settled  are  its  disputes 
concerning  the  nature  of  the  physical  functions  and  forces, 
concerning  the  existence  of  a  common  life-principle,  etc. ! 
How  incompetent  is  this  same  science,  together  with  medi- 
cal pathology,  to  give  a  thoroughly  scientific  and  satisfac- 
tory explanation  of  the  nature  and  cause  of  even  a  cold, 
the  simplest  and  commonest  form  of  disease  to  which  the 
human  system  is  subject !  How  significant  it  is,  too,  that 
the  medical  school  which,  to-day,  enjoys  the  highest  repu- 
tation in  the  scientific  circles,  and  is  most  widely  propa- 
gated, that  of  the  Vienna  professor,  Rokatanski,  deserves, 
on  account  of  its  extreme  reserve  towards  most  of  the 
older  theories  and  explanations  in  pathology  and  therapeu- 
tics, to  be  called  the  school  of  skeptics ;  and  indeed,  in 
many  of  its  representatives,  it  does,  and  very  appropri- 
ately, so  designate  itself.^ 

1  Ulrici,  in  the  before-mentioned  work,  pp.  145, 268  ff.    Comp.  Auslaud,  1868,  No. 
42 :    "  Die  Wirkung  der  Gifte." 


88  THE    BREMEN   LECTURES 

I  refer  to  these  proofs  of  the  present  unsettled  condition 
9x  natural  science,  proofs  to  which  I  could  add  others  by 
the  quantity,  not  because  it  is  my  wish  or  intention  to 
prophesy  the  speedy  bankruptcy  of  modem  physics  in  gen- 
eral, or  to  discredit  and  disparage  its  attainments,  or  to 
preach,  in  the  sense  in  which  the  phrase  is  understood  by 
an  obscurantism  which  shuns  light  and  truth,  the  "  conver- 
sion of  science."  No  one  can  entertain  a  higher  regard  for 
the  great  achievements  of  physical  science,  no  one  can 
cherish  a  more  unwavering  confidence  in  the  benign  influ- 
ences which  it  will  exert,  by  virtue  of  its  farther  advance- 
ment, even  upon  the  religious  side  of  human  culture,  than 
I  do  myself,  —  I,  who  have  more  than  once  borne  the  cen- 
sure of  the  more  strictly  orthodox,  for  accepting  only  too 
readily  all  the  chief  results  of  science.  What  I  have  had 
in  view,  in  these  references,  is  only  a  well-meant  caution 
against  too  unconditional  and  too  credulous  a  belief  in  one 
particular  branch  of  science,  which,  while  it  is  one  of  the 
youngest  of  all  the  studies  of  nature,  is  yet  one  pre-emi- 
nently given  to  assailing  the  Biblical  account  of  creation, 
for  the  defence  of  which  we  are  here  especially  concerned. 

Geology,  or  the  science  which  treats  of  the  processes  by 
which  the  earth  was  formed,  and  the  preliminary  study, 
geognosy,  which  investigates  the  facts  of  the  earth's  struc- 
ture, —  both  date  back  not  much  beyond  the  beginning  of 
the  present  century.  It  was  about  the  year  1790,  when,  as 
cotemporaries,  and  yet  working  independently  of  each 
other,  the  first  two  really  scientific  geologists,  namely,  the 
Scotchman  James  Hutton,  and  our  own  countryman  Abra 
ham  Werner,  of  Freiberg  in  Saxony,  began  to  be  recog- 
nized, —  the  former  as  the  founder  of  Plutonism,  or  the  doc- 
trine of  the  formation  of  the  world  in  its  present  state  by 
the  agency  of  fire ;    and  the    latter  as  the  author  of  the 


THE  DOCTRINE  OF  CREATION  89 

opposite  or  Neptunian  hypothesis,  which  attributes  the  con 
struction  of  our  globe  to  the  action  of  water.  From  the 
controversies  which  have  raged  among  the  adherents  of 
these  two  rival  theories,  the  entire  present  development  of 
geological  science  has  been  brought  about.  And  if,  in 
these  circles,  not  long  since,  Plutonism,  or  the  central-fire 
hypothesis,  reigned  so  exclusively  that  the  participancy  of 
water  in  the  formation  of  the  earth  appeared  to  be  either 
entirely  banished  or  at  least  reduced  to  a  minimum,  the 
latest  years  have,  on  the  other  hand,  found  so  many  im- 
portant arguments  and  learned  supporters  for  the  Neptu- 
nian theory,  that  now,  to  be  a  Vulcanist  or  a  Plutonist,  in 
the  earlier  sense  of  these  names,  is  deemed  equivalent  to 
being  almost  unscientific  ;  and  so,  again,  as  the  oldest  rep- 
resentative of  this  side  of  the  question,  the  Bible  is  begin- 
ning to  come  into  favor  (comp.  Gen.  1  :  2,  2  Pet.  3:5).^ 
The  complicated  dispute,  however,  is  still  b}^  no  means 
settled  ;  besides,  there  are  numerous  other  dissensions,  of  a 
subordinate  class,  agitating  this  science,  —a  science  which, 
in  order  to  solve  accurately  all  the  problems  which  have 
presented  themselves  in  reference  to  the  primeval  history 
of  our  planet,  would,  strictl}^  speaking,  require  data  to  be 
derived  not  only  from  a  geognostical  survey  of  all  the  con- 
tinents and  islands,  but  also  of  the  seas  ;  whereas,  in  truth, 
it  has  as  yet  investigated,  in  exact  mining  fashion  and  to  a 
sufficient  depth,  scarcely  a  tithe  of  the  earth's  surface. 
Skepticism,  hj^percriticism,  and  spurious  dogmatism  have 
here  also  abundantly  figured,  and,  often  enough  even  up  to 
the  present  day,  have  occasioned  hindrances  to  the  ad- 
vancement of  knowledge.  The  description  given  by  Spal- 
lanzani,  towards  the  close  of  last  century  (1788),  of  the  in- 
ternal state  of  the  volcano  of  Stromboli,  was  discredited 

1  See  my  '•  Urgeschiclite  der  Erde  und  des  Menschen,"  p.  35  ff. 


90  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

until  the  beginning  of  this  century,  when  its  correctness 
was  proved  by  the  investigations  of  other  travellers.  Re- 
garding the  genuineness  of  the  fossil  skeletons  of  several 
strangely  formed  animals,  belonging  to  the  older  world, 
such  as  the  plesiosaurus,  the  pterodactyl,  etc.,  there  have 
been  expressed  in  our  century,  and  by  men  eminently 
schooled  in  science,  doubts  as  earnest  as  were  the  judg- 
ments with  which  the  guess-work  and  superstition  of  a  cen- 
tury or  so  ago  favored  this  same  class  of  discoveries,  —  as 
was,  for  example,  the  opinion  to  which  the  Zurich  physicist 
Scheiizer  came  (about  1530)  in  regard  to  the  remains  of  a 
giant  salamander,  that  they  were  those  of  a  man  who  had 
perished  in  the  flood  !^  As  there  was,  in  that  age,  alto- 
gether too  ready  a  disposition  to  resort  to  the  Noachian 
deluge  to  explain  by  it  all  possible  palaeontological  discov- 
eries, so,  from  the  thirtieth  year  of  this  century  till  most 
recently,  the  opposite  narrowness  obtained  with  most  geolo- 
gists, namely,  the  tenet  that  the  fossiliferous  strata  of  the 
so-called  diluvial  period  do  not  contain  any  human  re- 
mains ;  that  there  are  no  traces  left  of  the  human  race  de- 
stroyed by  the  Biblical  flood,  that  the  geological  deluge,  as 
a  catastrophe  occurring  before  the  existence  of  our  race, 
must  be  distinguished  from  the  great  flood  attested  by  the 
traditions  of  the  old  world,  —  an  error  which  has  led  not 
only  to  a  hypercritical  disparagement  of  this  event  as  the 
product  of  ancient  childish  legend,  but  frequently  also  to 
incorrect  conclusions  respecting  important  geognostical 
discoveries.  For  example,  it  has  led  to  a  denial  of  the  di- 
luvial, or,  more  properly,  perhaps,  of  the  antediluvial  (ter- 
tiary), age  of  numerous  fossil  skulls  which  have  been 
found.     This  was  the  case  with  the  one  termed  the  Engis 

1  Vide  my  Urgeschichte  der  Erde,  p.  45.    Comp.  A.  von  Humboldt,  Kosmos  iv., 
p.  296.    Vilmar's  Pastorallheol.    Blatter,  vi.,  p.  203. 


THE   DOCTRINE   OF   CREATION  91 

skull,  discovered  by  Schmerling  in  1833,  the  coming  of 
which  down  to  us  from  the  diluvial  epoch  was  so  long  dis- 
puted, until,  of  late,  by  the  exhumation  of  a  large  number 
of  other  skulls  of  similarly  great  antiquity,  it  has  been  ele- 
vated, according  to  the  judgment  of  most  inquirers,  into 
certainty.^  But  even  yet,  when  some  have  begun  to  clas- 
sify the  annually  increasing  collection  of  fossil  human  re- 
mains with  reference  to  periods,  and,  accordingly,  we  have 
mammoth-men  (i.  e.,  men  of  the  very  oldest,  probably 
the  tertiary  epoch,  the  period  of  mammoths,  mastodons, 
cave-bears,  etc.)  and  reindeer-men  (i.  e.,  men  of  the  proper 
diluvial  or  ice  period,  when  all  "Western  Europe  seems  to 
have  been  overrun  by  herds  of  reindeer) ,  there  are  not  want- 
ing distinguished  geological  authorities,  as,  for  instance,  the 
well-known  author  of  the  "History of  the  Creation,"  Bur- 
meister,  or  Professor  Schaaffhausen  of  Bonn,  who,  in  truth, 
do  not  deny  the  coming  to  light  of  petrified  human  remains 
as  a  whole,  but  yet  consider  it  A^ery  questionable  whether 
even  the  oldest  fossil  of  this  species  dates  back  to  the  ter- 
tiary epoch.^ 

Though  so  young,  so  far  from  being  relieved  of  obscuri- 
ties and  brought  to  reliable  conclusions,  and  so  marked  by 
dissensions  still  in  many  of  its  most  prominent  represen- 
tatives, it  is  precisely  this  one  of  the  natural  sciences  which 
attacks  with  peculiar  vehemence  our  Biblical  doctrine  of 
creation,  and,  with  it,  also  most  other  points  belonging  to 
the  Scriptural  view  of  the  world.  This  it  does,  supported 
by  a  method  of  reckoning  the  earth's  chronology,  which, 
together  with  the  entire  geological  school  by  which  this 
method  is  adopted,  first  began  to  come  into  more  general 


1  Burmeister,  GescMchte  der  Schopfung,  p.  612  ff. 

2  Bunneister,  ibid.  —  Schaaffhausen,  in    Das    Archiv  fUr   Anthropologie,    IL 
(1867),  p.  359. 


92  THE   BREMEN    LECTURES 

recognition  some  thirty  years  or  so  since.  It  was  in  the  year 
1830,  when  the  Englishman  Charles  Lyell  came  out,  in  his 
extended  work,  "The  Principles  of  Geology,"^  which  was 
followed  bj^  a  smaller  manual  entitled  "  The  Elements  of 
Geology,"  ^  as  the  author  of  that  novel  theory  of  the  forma- 
tion of  the  earth  which  makes  the  lowest  and  oldest  strata  of 
the  rocks  to  have  been  produced  by  processes  exactly  analo- 
gous to  the  physical  changes  taking  place  at  present  upon  the 
surface  of  the  globe,  namely,  by  elevations  and  subsidences 
of  the  land  above  and  below  the  surface  of  the  sea,  aqueous 
depositions,  etc.  The  distinguishing  feature  of  this  hypothe- 
sis is  not  so  much  its  Neptunian  element,  —  for,  with  the 
place  allowed  for  the  action  of  water,  Lyell  vindicates  also 
one  for  that  of  fire,  in  the  construction  of  the  earth,  —  but 
it  is  rather  the  extraordinarily  slow  and  gradual  manner 
with  which  those  ancient  operations,  being  made  by  this 
theory  to  conform  to  the  way  in  which  modern  geological 
changes  are  effected,  are  represented  to  have  been  pro- 
duced. This  doctrine,  of  so  extremely  slow  and  quiet  an 
unfolding  of  the  history  of  our  planet,  with  reference  to 
which  the  school  of  Lyell  has  been  appropriately  stj'led 
that  of  the  geological  quietists,  naturally  brings  this  same 
school  into  collision  with  the  Biblical  account  of  creation, 
and,  as  well,  with  the  ancient  chronology  of  the  Bible  in 
general.  For,  notwithstanding  that  the  days  in  the  Mosaic 
record  of  creation  may  be  understood  as  expressive  of 
longer  periods  than  simply  days  of  twenty-four  hours  each, 
and,  accordingly,  we  may  interpret  them  as  each  an  epoch, 
say,  of  one  thousand  years,  for  which  interpretation  the 
Scriptures  themselves,  in  texts  such  as  Ps.  90 :  4,  2  Pet. 
3:8,  furnish  support,  as  well  as  that  the  old  Etruscan  and 
Persian  cosmogonies    (strikingly  resembling   the   account 

1  iBt  ed.,  1830,  seq.,  4  voIb.         *  let  ed.,  1  vol.,  1838. 


THE   DOCTRINE   OF   CREATION  93 

of  Moses)  are  in  harmony  with  this  view,  as  they  both 
specify  that  the  world  was  created  in  six  thousand  years,^ 
nevertheless,  between  the  millions,  na}^,  the  billions  of 
years  which  Lyell  and  his  school  hj^pothecate  for  the  con- 
tinuance of  the  earth's  formation  processes  and  these  few 
decades  of  centuries,  there  remains  a  most  tremendous 
interval ;  and  so,  the  quietistic  chronology  of  this  school 
removes  even  the  last  of  those  creative  processes,  the 
tertiary  together  with  the  diluvial  formations,  to  such  a 
cloudy  distance,  that,  in  comparison  with  its  myriads  of 
ages,  the  brief  period,  allowed  by  the  Bible  to  have 
elapsed  since  the  beginning  of  human  history,  shrivels  up 
into  insignificancy.  Besides,  this  geological  quietism 
serves  as  the  preparation  for  a  theory  of  the  origin  of  the 
organic  world  which  cannot  be  made  to  accord,  either  with 
the  Biblical  history  of  creation,  or  with  our  Christian  view 
of  the  Divine  Being  in  general.  Lyellism  is  the  basis  and 
the  indispensable  condition  of  Darwinism,  that  doctrine 
of  the  development  or  transformation  of  all  the  organisms 
of  the  vegetable  and  animal  kingdoms  from  an  insignificant 
number  of  original  types,  which,  logically  carried  out,  not 
only  excludes  the  idea  of  a  personal  Creator  (though,  as 
we  have  seen,  the  author  himself  shrank  back  from  this), 
but  also  annihilates  all  distinction  between  the  animal 
creation  and  man,  and  thus  makes  the  first  representative 
of  our  race  to  have  sprung,  through  a  development  of  the 
most  highly  organized  animal,  —  the  ape,  —  from  a  lower 
than  his  own  natural  order  of  being.  The  geological  system 
of  Lyell  is  most  intimately  and  inseparably  connected 
with  positive  materialism,  whose  hypothesis  of  the  origina- 
tion of  man  from  the  ape  can,  only  under  the  supposition 

1  Suidas,  B.  V.  yvpprjvCa.  Spiegel,  Zeitschrift  der  deutch  morgenlandiachen  Gte 
leliHchaft,  v.,  p.  221  ff. 


94  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

of  an  immensely  long  period  for  the  existence  of  the  human 
race,  and  as  well  for  the  development  of  earthly  being  in 
general,  claim  for  itself  even  an  appearance  of  truth. 

From  what  has  been  presented,  it  is  evident  that  the 
apologist  for  the  Biblical  doctrine  of  creation  has  properly 
CO  do  with  but  one  antagonist :  the  geological  quietism  of 
the  Lyellians ;  —  this  fruitful  seed-bed  of  all  the  modern 
materialistic  doctrines  ;  this  extensive  armory  from  which 
not  only  a  Darwin,  but  also  a  Huxley,  a  Vogt,  a  Moleschott, 
a  Biichner,  etc.,  have  been  accustomed  to  draw  the  only 
really  cutting  weapons  for  the  defence  of  their  systems,  the 
only  clothing,  ornamented  with  the  appearance  of  truth, 
with  which  they  have  decked  out  their  respective  theories. 
If  this  one  chief  antagonist  is  overthrown,  then  the  entire 
structure  of  materialistic  hypotheses  and  systems  has  lost 
its  seemingly  scientific  support,  and  must,  in  consequence, 
like  an  overturned  aerial  card-house,  tumble  to  pieces. 

But  the  downfall  of  this  opponent  can  with  difficulty  be 
much  longer  stayed.  At  all  events,  it  appears  to  us  there 
is  scarcely  a  much  longer  life  in  prospect  for  Lyellism  than 
there  was  for  many  another  scientific  hypothesis  which  for 
a  time  enjoyed  great  popularity,  but  was  discovered  to  be 
one-sided  by  a  later  generation.  As  Stahl's  phlogiston 
theory  ruled  for  several  decades  of  years  in  the  department 
of  chemistry,  then  to  give  place  to  one  better  founded  ;  as 
the  atomic  theory  of  Dalton  and  Berzelius,  after  a  longer 
undisputed  sway  in  the  same  province,  seems  to  be  at 
present  tottering  and  in  serious  danger  of  being  deposed 
by  another  hypothesis  ;  as,  in  the  domain  of  geology  itself, 
one-sided  Plutonism  was  compelled  to  retreat  before  the 
modern  doctrine  of  chemical  force,  or  chemical  Neptunism  ; 
—  so,  to  us,  the  days  of  the  still  reigning  chronological 
method  of  the  geologists  seem  to  be  numbered,  and  we  do 


THE   DOCTRINE   OF   CREATION  95 

not  consider  the  time  to  be  far  removed,  when  the  one- 
sidedness,  the  arbitrariness,  and  the  scientific  unreliable- 
ness  of  the  time-reckoniDgs  based  upon  this  method  will 
be  universally  recognized.  In  a  word,  the  Lyellian  quiet- 
ism, with  its  opposition  to  the  Biblical  doctrine  of  creation, 
appears  to  us  to  be  one  of  those  scientific,  or  rather  theo- 
retico-scientific  temporary  hypotheses,  on  the  one  side  of 
a  skeptical  and  on  the  other  of  a  superstitio-dogmatical 
character,  the  eventual  overthrow  of  which  by  the  higher 
power  of  truth  generally  marks  the  principal  steps  in  an 
advance  of  science  from  an  older  to  a  newer  epoch. 

In  proof  of  this  there  are  many  evidences ;  a  few  of 
which  may  here  be  indicated. 

1.  The  assumption  that  the  earth  was  formed  exactly  in 
accordance  with  the  same  laws  of  development,  and  so  in 
corresponding  long  periods  of  time,  by  which  the  changes 
at  present  occurring  upon  its  surface  are  produced, 
involves  a  great  mistake  in  principle.  For  it  confounds 
the  two  facts  of  creation  and  preservation,  the  essential 
difference  of  which  not  only  theology,  but  all  analogies  in 
nature  and  the  entire  realm  of  our  earthly  experience, 
teach.  Or,  where  is  the  organism  which  does  not,  in  the 
period  of  its  origination  and  development,  gi'ow  incompa- 
rably faster,  change  with  altogether  more  readiness,  than 
afterwards,  during  the  term  of  its  more  mature  existence? 
\Yhere  is  the  plant  which  does  not  first  pass  through  a 
season  of  vigorous  germination,  of  luxuriant  growth,  in 
order  afterwards  to  enter  upon  a  stage  of  steadier  and 
slower  development,  the  harbinger  of  its  eventual  decay? 
Where  is  there  an  animal  which,  while  an  embryo  or  a 
foetus  in  its  mother's  womb,  and  also  during  a  portion  of 
its  more  independent  existence,  did  not  reveal  a  far  more 
rapidly  growing  and  developing  energy,  than  after  it  had 


96  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

attained  full  growth?  And,  in  order  not  to  leave  uu* 
touched  the  domain  of  the  inorganic  processes,  where  is  the 
metal,  the  stone,  or  the  crystal,  which,  while  it  was  liquid, 
alterable,  adapted  to  quick  sudden  transformation,  during 
the  process  of  its  formation,  was  not,  on  the  other  hand,  as 
a  consolidated  body,  of  a  nature  more  or  less  firm  and 
enduring?  Where  is  there  a  house  built  but  that,  in  the, 
masonry  of  it,  an  analogous  experience  can  be  witnessed,* 
the  experience  that  after  a  short  period  of  variableness, 
while  it  is  becoming  dry  and  hard,  it  also  passes  into  a 
state  of  greater  constancy  ?  ^  But  what  is  true  of  the  sep- 
arate inorganic  and  organic  elements  of  which  the  earth  is 
composed,  is  also  true  of  the  earth  itself.  The  macrocosm 
can  have  had  no  different  history  of  origination  and  devel- 
opment from  that  of  its  constituent  microcosms.  The 
house,  which  is  man's  temporal  dwelling-place,  must  have 
had,  just  as  well  as  man  or  any  of  the  different  creatures 
about  him,  also  its  period  of  growth,  or  the  period  during 
which  it  was  built  and  prepared  for  its  inhabitant  by  the 
Divine  Architect.     (Heb.  3  :  4,  11  :  10.) 

2.  The  ordinary  geological  changes  of  the  present ;  for 
example,  the  secular  elevations  and  subsidences  of  the 
islands  and  continents,  with  respect  to  the  level  of  the  sea ; 
the  destructions  and  depositions  caused  by  the  action  of 
running  water  ;  the  sinking  of  the  surface  in  marsh  and  in 
peat  localities,  —  all  this  is  found  by  an  impartial  exami- 
nation to  be  wholl}^  unfitted  to  be  used  as  the  analogy,  or 
measure,  by  v/hich  to  determine  the  times  of  the  ancient 
world's  processes  of  formation.  For,  incidental  circum- 
stances, often  of  only  an  unimportant  character,  such  as  a 
peculiarly  violent  rain-storm,  a  spring-tide,  or  even  a  tree 
or  a  shrub,  torn  from  its  place  by  the  force  of  a  stream, 

1  Comp.  my  Urgeschichte,  p.  146  f. 


THE   DOCTRINE   OF    CREATION  97 

and  stranded  bj^  it  so  as  to  occasion  suddenly  the  forma* 
tion  of  a  sand-bank,  can  in  a  little  time  so  materially 
interfere  with  the  working  of  those  agencies,  that  all 
similarity  of  their  action,  as  continued  through  long 
periods,  seems  to  be  set  aside.  For  primeval  antiquity, 
however,  not  only  these  lesser  disturbances,  but  mighty 
catastrophes,  in  part  of  a  Plutonic  and  in  part  of  a  Neptu- 
nian order,  are  to  be  conceived  as  operative,  —  catastrophes 
of  such  extraordinary  magnitude  that  the  earthquake  in 
South  America  the  year  past,  or  that  of  1755,  by  which 
Lisbon  was  destroyed,  can  furnish  us,  at  most,  but  a  faint 
conception  of  the  suddenness  and  extent  of  their  workings  ; 
catastrophes  which,  whether  in  building  up  or  in  destroy- 
ing, could  produce  more  colossal  effects  over  wide  stretches 
of  land  or  of  sea,  in  a  few  minutes,  than  their  feeble 
modern  imitators  could  in  centuries.^ 

3.  Besides  other  agencies  contributing  to  facilitate  the 
processes  by  which  the  earth  was  formed,  there  must  have 
been  some  of  a  physico-chemical  nature,  the  existence  of 
which  cannot  now,  with  certainty,  be  recognized  by  us ; 
and  especially  must  there  have  been  operative  then  a 
considerably  more  elevated  temperature  than  the  mean 
degi'ee  of  heat  obtaining  at  present  upon  the  surface  of  our 
planet ;  this  is  a  particular  which  even  the  Lyellians,  be 
they  Neptunian  or  Plutonian  in  view,  do  not  really  refuse 
to  concede,  though  they  fail  largely  in  deducing  from  it 
the  necessary  conclusions.  For,  given  a  considerably 
higher  degi-ee  of  heat  obtaining  in  those  earlier  times  than 
that  now  prevailing,  then  certain  chemical  changes,  such 
as  the  conversion  of  the  primeval  forests,  sunk  under 
water,  into  the  mineral  coal  beds  of  to-day,  the  crystalliza- 
tion of  metallic  or  of  silicate  solutions  into  solid  rocks,  etc., 

1  Of.  my  Urgeschichte,  p.  143  ff. 
G 


98  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

must  have  taken  place  with  altogether  greater  rapidity 
than  any  similar  changes  in  nature  are  at  present  being 
effected ;  —  a  conclusion  which  has  been  of  late  most 
irrefutably  established  b}^  experiments  instituted  by  promi- 
nent geological  authorities,  and  particularly  by  the  trans- 
formation of  different  vegetable  and  animal  substances  into 
stone  coal,  —  a  result  attained  by  Goppert  at  Breslau  in 
a  few  j^ears,  by  the  continued  application  of  intense  heat ; 
and,  being  thus  established,  it  sufficiently  disproves  the 
current  geological  assertion,  that  so  many  thousands  of 
years  were  required  for  the  ancient  processes  in  question.^ 

4.  This  supposition  of  a  higher  temperature  obtaining 
during  the  processes  of  the  earth's  creation  is  sustained 
by  astronomical  probabilities  and  postulates  which  learned 
investigation,  in  order  to  explain  the  phenomena  in  hand, 
is  beginning  nowadays  to  take  more  and  more  zealously 
into  consideration ;  whether  with  Adhemar,  James  CroU, 
and  others,  it  conjectures  that  a  strong  eccentricity  of  the 
earth's  orbit,  existing  in  connection  with  the  precession 
of  the  equinoxes,  is  the  occasion  for  an  alternation  between 
extreme  heat  and  extreme  cold,  and  so  attempts  to  explain, 
on  the  one  hand,  the  extraordinary  productiveness  of  the 
ancient  flora  and  fauna  during  certain  stadia  of  the  crea- 
tion, and,  on  the  other,  the  ice  or  cold  epochs  interrupting 
these  periods  of  a  more  productive  order ;  or  whether  it 
postulates,  with  Poison,  the  mathematician,  and  with  the 
distinguished  botanist  and  palaeontologist,  Oswald  Heer,  of 
Zurich,  as  the  solution  of  this  presumed  vicissitude  between 
the  warm  and  cold  epochs  (or  between  peculiarly  produc- 
tive "spring  times  of  the  world"  and  more  languid 
"periods  of  stability"),  that  there   are   in  the   heavens 

1  Andr.  Wagner,  Die  Berufung  auf  die  Naturwissenschaft  als  Instanz  zur  Be- 
Btreitung  dcs  mosaischen  Schopfungsbcrichts. —  Evang.  Kirchcnztg.  18G2.  No.  10. 


THE   DOCTRINE   OP   CREATION  99 

differently  warmed  spaces,  through  which  our  solar  system 
passes  in  circling  about  its  central  sun.  These  are,  of 
course,  only  hypotheses,  though  they  are  supported  by 
important  astronomical  facts,  and,  what  is  more,  they  are 
not  at  variance  with  what  is  said  in  the  Scriptures  of  an 
alternation  between  day  and  night  in  the  work  of  crea- 
tion.^ 

5.  That  the  end  of  the  creation  of  organisms,  especially 
that  the  origin  of  the  human  race,  should  be  located  so 
extremely  far  back  as  the  geologists  put  it,  is  rendered 
highly  improbable  by  the  circumstance  that  none  of  the 
historical  traditions  of  the  oldest  nations,  as  far  as  they 
bear  any  traces  of  credibility,  and  have  not  been  distorted 
by  priestly  fable  into  the  monstrous,  ever  go  farther  back 
than  from  2500  to  2700  years  B.  C,  thus  not  beyond  the 
Biblical  deluge,  —  a  fact  which  has  been  established  re- 
cently by  a  thorough  exploration  of  the  earliest  civil  and 
religious  histories  of  Eg3q)t  and  of  the  Chinese  Empire, 
fields  of  inquiry  which,  as  long  as  they  were  investigated 
in  a  superficial,  credulous  manner,  were,  in  different 
quarters,  imagined  to  contain  weapons  especiall}^  effec- 
tive for  combating  the  ancient  history  and  chronology  of 
the  Bible.2 

From  these  considerations,  the  force  of  which  is  recog- 
nized by  such  superior  naturalists  as  the  botanist  Goppert, 
already  mentioned,  the  geologists  Murchison,  Dana,  A. 
Wagner,  W.  Leonhardt,  the  anthropologists  R.  Wagner 
and  R.  E.  Yon  Baer,  etc.,  we  cannot  conclude  otherwise 
than  that  the  Lyellian  rejection  of  the  Biblical  account  of 
creation   and  of  its  time  estimates  is  only  an  extremely 

1  Ausland,  1867,  No.  51;  1868,  Nos.  12,  28. 

»  G.  T.  Meadows,  The  Chinese,  p.  34.    Comp.  the  Duke  of  Argyl's  "Recent 
Bpeculations  on  Primeval  Man,"  in  ''  Good  Words,"  1868,  p.  286,  sq. 


100  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

one-sided  skepticism,  which  is  really  only  a  masked  super- 
stition, reminding  one,  as  to  its  figures,  of  the  extravagant 
estimates  given  for  the  age  of  the  world  in  some  of  the  old 
cosmogonies  and  theogonies  of  the  nations  we  have 
named,  and  so  only  the  more  clearly  revealing  its  own 
want  of  scientific  soundness.  "With  the  certain  prospect, 
therefore,  that  this  will  ere  long  be  the  general  verdict,  we 
are  unprepared  to  surrender  our  belief  in  the  Biblical 
account  of  either  the  creation  in  general,  or  of  the  com- 
mencement of  human  history.  We  still  hold  fast  to  the 
fundamental  truths  of  the  inspired  view  of  the  world,  as 
they  are  found,  beautifully  harmonizing  with  the  results 
of  a  more  thorough  natural  science,  in  the  Mosaic  record. 
Of  none  of  the  sublime  truths  of  the  Scriptural  doctrine 
of  creation  are  we  willing  to  be  deprived ;  neither  of  that 
fundamental  tenet  of  monotheism,  that  God,  in  the  begin- 
ning, i.  e.,  the  beginning  of  time,  in  the  exercise  of  his 
own  free  will,  his  goodness  and  power,  called  the  heaven 
and  earth,  and  all  things  therein  living  and  moving,  into 
existence,  nor  of  the  more  closel}^  defined  conception  of 
this  creative  act,  intimated  in  the  Old  Testament  but 
brought  out  clearly  and  distinctively  in  the  New,  that  it  is 
the  Triune  God  to  which  the  universe  is  indebted  for  its 
being,  or  that  God  the  Father  through  the  Son  in  the  Holy 
Spirit  created  the  world. ^  And  as  little  as  we  are  willing 
to  relinquish  this  specifically  Christian  definiteness  of  the 
creative  act,  as  little  are  we  ready  to  part  with  any  essen- 
tial feature  of  the  facts  forming  according  to  the  Biblical 
tradition  the  outward  vesture  of  the  work  of  creation ; 
neither  with  the  creation  of  light  at  the  very  commence- 
ment of  all  world-being,  —  for  according  even  to  the  latest 
physics  the  light-force  is  the  basis  of  all  material  existence 

1  Comp.  my  Urgeschichte,  p.  28. 


THE   DOCTRINE   OP   CREATION  101 

^^see  above)  ;  nor  with  the  creation  of  the  stars  posteriorly 
to  that  of  the  light,  —  for  even  La  Place's  theorj'-  of  the 
formation  of  worlds  explains  and  supports  this  circum- 
stance ;  nor  with  the  fact  —  attested  not  only  by  the  giant 
coal  formations,  but  more  strongly  by  the  discoveries, 
recently  made  in  Bohemia,  Sweden,  and  other  localities,  of 
immense  masses  of  petrified  sea-plants  imbedded  in  the 
transition  rocks,  the  oldest  fossiliferous  strata  —  that  the 
vegetable  kingdom  preceded  the  animal  in  the  order  of 
their  genesis  ;  ^  nor,  again,  with  the  particular,  that  the 
plants  and  animals  were  originated  in  different  families 
and  species,  or  according  to  the  divine  principle,  each 
"  after  his  kind"  (Gen.  1 :  11,  12,  21,  etc.),  for  never  will 
the  Darwinian  theory  be  able  scientifically  to  establish  its 
absurd  notion  of  the  development  of  all  organisms  from 
one  primitive  type ;  nor,  lastly,  with  what  the  Scriptures 
teach  of  that  grand  final  act  of  creation, — the  bringing 
into  existence  of  man ;  his  appearance  immediately  after 
or  about  the  same  time  with  that  of  the  higher  classes  of 
land  mammals ;  his  being  made  in  the  image  of  God,  and 
destined  to  be  the  ruler  over  all  the  other  and  lower  orders 
of  creation  ;  the  commencement  of  his  history  in  a  world 
of  purity  and  happiness,  which  was  changed  from  that,  its 
original  state,  into  one  —  needing  a  redemption  —  of  mis- 
ery and  ruin,  only  by  his  own  act  of  disobedience,  and 
over  which  the  reign  of  death,  the  sad  necessity  of  dying, 
was  brought,  certainly  for  himself  if  not  for  the  other 
forms  of  life,  in  consequence  only  of  his  own  fall.  Par- 
ticulars belonging  to  this,  the  oldest  and  grandest  of  all 
the  paintings  of  the  creation,  may,  with  less  facility,  be 
adjusted  into  a  harmony  of  nature  and  revelation.     Indi- 

1  Ulrich  Stutz,  Die  Schopfungsgeschichtc  nach  Geologic  und  Bibel  (Zurich,  1867). 
p.  19.    Comp.  Ausland,  1868,  p.  907. 


102  THE   BREMEN  LECTURES 

vidual  obscurities  and  diflSculties,  the  most  skilful  apolo- 
gete,  the  profoundest  student  of  the  two  original  sources 
of  knowledge,  the  Bible  and  nature,  may  be  utterly  unable 
to  explain.  The  question,  for  example,  concerning  the 
origin  of  death  in  the  vegetable  and  animal  kingdoms,  or 
that  of  a  somewhat  similar  order  relative  to  the  fall  of 
Satan  and  the  demons,  —  of  these  and  other  similar  mys- 
teries respecting  which  no  clear  and  decisive  knowledge  is 
given  in  either  the  Old  or  the  New  Testament  Scriptures, 

—  a  truly  thorough  and  satisfactory  understanding  may  be 
denied  to  men  as  long  as  the  world  in  its  present  state 
endures.  Still,  we  are  not,  on  account  of  these  difficulties, 
to  barter  away  our  Biblical  doctrine  of  creation  to  the 
pantheistico-materialistic  unbelief  obtaining  in  these  times. 
An  adoption  of  the  arid,  comfortless,  and  monstrously 
irrational  view  of  the  Darwinists,  of  a  development  of 
the  world,  or  of  the  still  more  gloomy  doctrine  taught  by 
positive  materialism,  that  the  world  is  in  its  order  eternal, 
in  the  place  of  our  belief  in  the  creation  of  all  things  by 
the  Almighty  Triune  God  of  the  Bible,  would  be  one  of 
the  worst  doctrinal  mistakes  of  which  we  could  be  guilty, 

—  an  error  which  would  work,  in  all  the  departments  of 
our  Christian  theology,  irreparable  injury. 

I  remarked  at  the  opening  of  this  discussion,  there  is  no 
point  at  which  the  Biblical  conception  of  God  is  assailed 
more  frequently,  in  these  times,  than  it  is  respecting  the 
doctrine  of  creation. 

I  must  here  so  far  amend  that  assertion  as  to  have  it 
include  one  other  equally  disputed  point,  namely,  the 
doctrine  of  the  last  things.  Of  death,  as  the  transition  to 
a  state  of  rewards  and  punishments  ;  of  a  visible  return  of 
Christ  to  judge  the  world ;    of    a   passing   away  of  the 


THE   DOCTRINE   OF   CREATION  103 

present  order  of  things  in  preparation  for  the  creation  of 
a  new  heavens  and  a  new  earth,  —  of  all  this  the  material- 
ist of  our  day  is  willing  to  know  as  little  as  he  is  of  the 
calling  of  the  entire  visible  universe  into  being  by  the 
imperative  "Let  there  be"  of  a  personal  Creator.  The 
modern  unbelieving  view  of  the  world  has  as  little  of 
eschatology  in  its  dogmatics  as  it  has  of  a  chapter  on  the 
creation.  Regarding  the  future,  it  knows  but  a  single 
prospect,  —  the  continuation  of  the  present  order  of  things 
on  endlessly  ;  as  also  it  has  but  one  method  of  considering 
the  past,  which  is  to  look  as  far  back  as  possible  for  the 
commencement  of  the  earth's  history.  Its  consummation 
is  reached  in  the  absolute  materialism  of  H.  Czolbe,  who 
affirms  not  only  that  the  world  is  without  beginning,  but 
also  that  it  will  continue  on  without  end.^ 

There  is  a  school  of  theologians,  of  seemingly  earnest 
and  honest  contenders  for  a  true  Christianity  and  a  true 
church,  which  partakes  largely  of  this  pantheistico-materi- 
alistic  denial  of  both  the  beginning  and  the  end  of  the 
present  course  of  the  world.  A  zealous  worshipper  of  the 
spirit  of  the  times  (des  Zeitgeistes) ,  it  seeks  to  avoid  the 
thought  of  the  past  birth  of  time  out  of  God's  eternal 
being,  and  also  that  of  its  future  resumption  into  God's 
eternity.  With  these  two  points  of  weakness,  most  inti- 
mately related  to  each  other,  it  thinks  it  can  nevertheless 
exercise  a  strong  faith  in  the  central  fact  of  revealed  truth ; 
it  thinks  it  can,  without  the  traditional  doctrine  of  creation 
and  the  traditional  eschatology,  still  have  the  correct  doc- 
trine of  Jesus  Christ.  Its  actual  fruits  in  this  department 
prove  the  contrary.  The  way  it  handles  the  historical 
Christ,  at  one  time  disfiguring,  at  another  diminishing,  the 
picture,  to  make  it  conform  to  certain  modern  deceptive 

^  Comp.  Fabri,  Briefen  gegen  den  Materialismus  (2(1  Ed.)^  P-  87  ff. 


104  THE    BREMEN   LECTURES 

ideals,  —  the  way  it  denies  the  divinity  of  the  Saviour  and 
disparages  those  Scriptures  by  which  this  essential  is  at- 
tested, —  shows  incontrovertibly  that,  deprived  of  root  and 
top,  the  stock  itself  does  not  remain  uninjured,  or  that, 
when  the  foundation  is  undermined  and  the  roof  is 
removed,  the  entire  edifice  must  be  precipitated  into 
ruins.  The  doctrine  of  creation  is  of  most  indispensable 
need  to  the  whole  of  our  Christian  faith,  and  especially  to 
fjelief  in  the  person  and  work  of  Christ.  One  cannot  be  a 
Darwinist,  or  a  materialist,  regarding  the  Biblical  account 
of  creation,  and  at  the  same  time  be  consistently  —  a 
Christian ! 


LECTURE    III 
REASON,  CONSCIENCE,  AND  REVELATION 

By  HERMANN  CREMER,  D.  D. 

PROFESSOR    OF    THEOLOGY    AT    GREIFSWALD 


HERMANN'   CREMER,  D.  D. 


BIOGEAPHIOAL, 


Dr.  August  Hermann  Cremer  studied  at  Halle  and  at  Tubingen. 
He  was  born  October  18,  1834,  at  Unna,  in  Westphalia,  Ger- 
many. In  1859  he  became  pastor  at  Ostonnen,  near  Soest,  in 
Westphalia.  He  was  made  ordinary  professor  of  systematic 
theology  at  Greifswald,  and  also  pastor  of  St.  Mary's  Church 
there,  in  1870.  In  1879  he  was  a  delegate  to  the  General  Con- 
ference of  the  Evangelical  Alliance  at  Basel,  and  read  a  paper 
on  the  state  of  religion  in  Germany.  Dr.  Cremer  is  a  pro- 
found thinker  and  a  great  scholar.  He  has  published  a  large 
number  of  works.  Among  the  best  known  of  these  to  English- 
speaking  people,  because  translated  into  our  tongue,  are  his 
Bihlisch-theologisches  Worterbuch  der  neutestamentischen  Grdcitdt 
( "  BibUco-theological  Lexicon  of  New  Testament  Greek  " ),  and 
his  Ueber  den  Zustand  nach  dem  Tode  (''Beyond  the  Grave"), 
the  last  being  translated  by  Dr.  S.  T.  Lowrie,  and  published  in 
New  York,  1885. 


STJMMAEY  OF  LECTUKE  IH 


Between  reason,  conscience,  and  revelation  there  exists,  ac- 
cording to  some,  an  invincible  dissonance  ;  but  we  discern  here 
a  celestial  harmony — Oppositions  put  forward  between  reason 
and  revelation — What  is  reasonable  and  according  to  con- 
science?— Both  reason  and  conscience  have  to  do  with  the 
truth — Man's  need  of  the  truth,  for  which  he  has  capability, 
although  not  naturally  possessing  it — Pilate's  question  and 
Plato's  conclusion — Man  can  know  the  truth  ;  affinity  is  its  sign 
or  proof — ^Truth  the  necessary  complement  of  man's  being ;  it 
is  the  standard  of  man,  as  man  is  also  the  standard  of  the  truth 
— ^Truth  is  both  loved  and  feared ;  it  slays  and  makes  alive — 
Nature  of  the  truth  to  reveal  itself ;  must  be  personal ;  must  be 
God. — II.  Historic  Relation  of  Man  to  the  Truth.  Life-re- 
nunciation and  life-enjoyment  are  the  two  poles  at  which  hu- 
manity, unassisted  by  revelation,  has  often  arrived — Both  Stoi- 
cism and  Epicureanism  are  philosophies  of  despair — When 
Christianity  came  the  world  had  not  yet  found  the  truth,  and 
had  even  lost  the  beginnings  of  this  knowledge — Even  to-day 
science  (so-called)  has  no  answer  to  the  question.  What  is 
truth? — III.  Divine  Eevelation  Meets  the  Requirements  of 
Reason  and  Conscience,  and  Therefore  Has  a  Right  to  Demand 
for  Itself  Unconditional  Recognition.  Conscience  was  first  dis- 
covered by  the  religion  of  the  Bible — A  self-revelation  of  God 
must  be  regarded  as  possible  ;  it  is  also  necessary  or  requisite 
for  man's  needs — God  is  both  grace  and  truth  ;  this  is  the  Tri- 
une God,  the  God  of  Atonement — In  this  God  of  revelation  and 
salvation,  reason,  conscience,  the  human  life,  all  are  satisfied — 
The  entire  system  of  revelation  rests  upon  two  propositions : 
God,  sin — In  the  contest  against  the  truth  three  positions  may 
be  taken:  I  like  not,  I  can  not,  I  will  not.  Only  when  the 
third  position  has  been  taken,  does  the  real  spiritual  struggle 


m 

REASON,   CONSCIENCE,   AND  REVELATION 

BY   HERMIAISTN-    CREMER,   33.  D., 

PROFESSOR  OF  THEOLOGY  AT  GREITSWALD 

(3/|^  EASON,     Conscience,   Revelation,  —  these    words 
Srm     are  regarded  by  some  as  an  invincible  dissonance, 

/^ww  the  key-note  of  which  is  wrong ;  by  others  as  a 
dissonance  which,  though  it  may  be  and  ought  to 
be  overcome,  requires  for  this  end  a  diminution  of  the  inter- 
vals ;  while  we  unhesitatingly  affirm  that  we  discern  here  a 
harmony  such  as  no  earthly  music  can  offer,  such  as  the  mas- 
ters of  sacred  art  have  believed  they  heard,  when  attempt- 
ing to  imitate  in  their  creations  celestial  choruses,  in  whose 
manifold  complications  there  is  still  a  prevailing  harmony, 
comprehending  and  uniting  the  world  of  sounds. 

"With  distinct  consciousness,  the  bearers  and  the  adhe- 
rents of  divine  revelation  perceive  and  affirm  the  sharp  con- 
tradiction which  this  revelation  offers  to  the  methods  and 
results  of  merely  natural  thinking,  and  with  which  it  shoves 
aside,  and  passes  by,  not,  it  is  true,  as  superfluous,  but  yet 
as  vain  and  useless,  the  achievements,  great  as  they  seem 
to  us,  of  the  human  intelligence.  At  the  same  time,  how- 
ever, they  claim  that  divine  revelation,  and  this  regarded 
as  an  unveiling  of  hidden  truth,  is  not  merely  to  be  received 
on  trust,  but  apprehended  and  recognized  with  conscious 

clearness ;  and  thus  they  seem  to  require  a  self-denial  on 

109 


no  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

the  part  of  the  human  intelligence,  on  which  many,  from 
fear  of  losing  what  is  noblest  and  best  in  them,  find  it  diffi- 
cult to  decide.  ^ 

It  is  not  to  be  wondered  at,  therefore,  that,  by  the  repre- 
sentatives and  adherents  of  this  human  reason  and  wisdom 
so  severely  rebuked,  the  claim  of  divine  revelation,  that  is, 
of  the  Sacred  Scriptures,  to  be  the  truth,  is  decidedly  op- 
posed, and  that  the  disparagements  received  are  richly 
repaid.  E.  g.,  the  reasonableness  of  that  which  calls  it- 
self a  revelation  is  disputed,  and  belief  in  or  recognition  of 
the  same  is  referred  to  a  certain  spiritual  indolence,  or,  in 
the  most  pardonable  case,  to  a  defective  schooling  in  the 
use  of  the  reason.  In  no  case  is  such  a  belief  allowed  to 
be  compatible  with  sound  reason,  while  the  practice  of 
insisting  upon  a  recognition  of  revelation  is  characterized 
as  obscurantism  and  an  enslavement  of  the  spiritual  life. 

1  The  Scripture  expressions  alluding  thereto  are  familiar.  When  Peter  sayg, 
"  "We  believe  and  are  sure;"  and  John,  ''We  have  known  and  believed,"  (John 
6:69;  1  John  4:16);  when  Paul  writes,  "  By  manifestation  of  the  truth,  com- 
mending ourselves  to  every  man's  conscience  in  the  sight  of  God"  (2  Cor.  4:2), 
—  we  see  the  question  is  not  concerning  a  faith  accepted  on  insufficient  grounds, 
but  concerning  a  faith  based  upon  and  requiring  knowledge,  as  Paul  says  in  an- 
other place,  "  That  the  communication  of  thy  faith  may  become  effectual  by  the 
acknowledging  of  every  good  thing  which  is  in  you  in  Christ  Jesus"  (Phile.  6). 
Assent  of  the  rationally  observing  and  reflecting  man,  recognition,  full,  uncondi- 
tionally free,  and  yet  inwardly  necessitated  assent  of  the  conscience,  this  the  reve- 
lation whose  register  we  have  in  the  Sacred  Scriptures  —  this  the  Bible  requires. 
For  reason  and  conscience  are  not  otherwise  free  than  that  they  are  bound  by  the 
truth ;  and  to  furnish  truth,  the  sole,  complete  truth,  is  the  object  of  revelation. 
As  to  these  claims  understanding  is  possible,  but  more  difficult  is  it  when  Paul  'Je- 
scribes  the  opposing  "  wisdom  of  this  world  "  as  foolishness,  when  he  admonishes 
the  Colossians  not  to  allow  themselves  to  be  spoiled  through  the  philosophy  and 
vain  deceit  of  human  teaching,  when  he  has  so  poor  an  opinion  of  the  wisdom  held 
so  high  in  the  world  that  in  one  place  he  says,  "  Professing  themselves  to  be 
wise,  they  became  fools ; "  and  in  another  sets  up  the  requirement,  "  If  any  man 
seemeth  to  be  wise,  let  him  become  a  fool  that  he  may  be  wise."  The  worst,  how- 
ever, appears  to  be  when  he  makes  it  a  reproach  of  the  reason  that  it  causes  men 
to  be  at  enmity  with  God  by  wicked  works.  (Comp.  1  Cor.  1:  20  ff.;  Col.  2:8; 
Rom.  1:  22;  Eph.  2:  3,  and  4: 18;  Col.  1 :  21.) 


REASON,   CONSCIENCE,   AND  REVELATION  111 

As  we  are  fully  aware  of  these  reproaches,  nay,  as  we  pro- 
fess to  understand  them,  and  would  only  the  more  decidedly 
defend  the  claims  of  divine  revelation,  we  are  in  duty  bound 
to  consider  the  former,  and  both  to  become  clear  ourselves 
as  to  the  just  grounds  of  these  claims,  and  to  show  our  op- 
ponents that  divine  revelation  really  has  no  need  to  fear  a 
thorough  examination  before  the  tribunal  of  reason  and  con- 
science. We  recognize  ourselves  as  bound  to  investigate  the 
claims  of  divine  revelation  to  reasonableness  and  complete 
truth,  to  inquire  into  the  possibility  of  a  rational  recognition 
on  the  part  of  man  of  these  claims,  and  of  a  conscientious 
subjection  of  himself  to  them,  and  to  judge  by  the  require* 
ments  which  reason  and  conscience  ever3'where  make, 
whether  we  are  to  understand  that  the  revelation  of  God 
meets,  and  perhaps  more  than  meets,  all  these  requirements, 
or  whether  humanity  would  have  ground,  in  the  name  of 
reason  and  —  as  it  has  only  recently  been  perfected  —  of 
conscience,  to  protest  against  this  obtrusive  intermingling 
of  a  revelation  in  the  restless  labor  and  development  of  the 
human  spirit. 

We  shall  have,  then,  first,  to  consider  what  it  is  that 
reason  and  conscience  require  of  that  which  they  should 
recognize  as  according  to  reason  and  conscience,  —  thus 
what  agrees  with  reason  and  conscience.  Secondly,  we 
must  ask,  how  much  of  that  which  agi-ees  with  reason  and 
conscience  has  been  found,  without  the  intervention  of  di- 
vine revelation,  by  our  race,  in  the  progress  of  its  spirit- 
ual development ;  and,  lastl}^,  our  theme  will  lead  us  to 
notice,  whether  divine  revelation,  as  attested  for  us  in  the 
Sacred  Scriptures,  is  entitled  to  demand,  as  it  does,  uncon- 
ditional recognition,  or  whether  its  requirement  is  so  much 
the  more  immoderate,  the  more  decidedly  and  definitely  it 
professes  by  itself  alone  to  furnish  the  truth. 


112  THE    BREMEN   LECTURES 


It  is  not  accidental,  or  merely  required  in  some  way  by 
the  constellations  of  the  present,  that  we  do  not  now,  as 
was  formerly  the  custom,  inquire  into  the  relation  of 
reason  and  revelation  simply  ;  but  the  assent  of  conscience 
also  is  in  these  times  considered  requisite.  We  should  be 
tempted  —  did  the  matter  not  have  a  very  dark  reverse 
side  —  to  characterize  it  as  a  decided  advance,  that  the  old 
one-sided  opposition,  in  the  name  of  reason,  has  changed 
into  a  stronger  one  in  the  name  of  both  reason  and  con- 
science. For  since  it  is  the  aim  of  revelation  to  furnish  not 
merely  truth,  —  something  that  is  true,  —  but  the  truth,  — 
that  which  alone  is  true,  —  it  addresses  itself  not  merely 
to  our  reason,  but  to  reason  and  conscience,  the  organs 
and  capabilities  of  our  being  which  we  have  for  the  truth. 
As  to  the  nature  of  the  reason,  we  can  and  must,  as  will 
undoubtedly  on  all  sides  be  admitted,  describe  it  as  not 
merely  in  general  the  ability  to  know,  but  more  particu- 
larly the  ability  to  know  the  truth,  to  distinguish  between 
seeming  and  being,  to  penetrate  into  the  nature  of  things. 
The  truth,  however,  is  that  which  was,  and  is,  and  is  to  be, 
according  to  the  original  signification  of  the  word  ^  in 
our  golden  German  vernacular ;  that  which  has  continuance 
and  value,  when  all  else  perishes  and  is  of  worth  no 
longer,^  the  eternal  and  unchangeable  above  all  that  is 
temporal  and  transitory ;  thus  also  the  law  that  rules  over 
all,  and  commits  to  destruction  whatever  does  not  adjust 
itself  to  it.  Accordingly,  the  truth  preserves  for  us  a 
moral  interest,  and  in  the  conscience  now  we  feel,  and  by 
the  conscience  become  aware  of,  the  relation  between  our- 

»  Wahrheit. 

*  It  is  deeply  grounded,  that  humanity  sets  nothing  more  readily  than  gold 
mammon,  with  its  value,  in  the  place  of  God  and  his  truth  (Matt.  6 :  24). 


REASON,    CONSCIENCE,    AND    REVELATION  113 

selves  and  the  truth,  of  the  unconditional  demand  of  the 
truth  upon  us  for  its  practical  recognition  and  the  subject- 
ing of  our  entire  selves  to  it,  on  the  one  hand,  and  of  the 
distance  at  which  we  find  ourselves  from  full  compliance 
with  that  demand  on  the  other.  The  conscience  adds  to 
the  idea  of  the  truth,  as  its  necessary  counterpart,  the 
idea  of  righteousness,  of  the  truth  translated  into  life. 
(Comp.  1  John  1 :  6,  8).  "Where  truth  is,  there  righteous- 
ness must  be,  and  only  where  truth  is  can  righteousness  be. 

"With  the  truth,  therefore,  it  is  that  reason  and  con- 
science have  to  do.  This  is  their  unifying  centre  and  aim. 
Where  reason  is,  there  is  conscience ;  where  conscience  is, 
there  is  reason.  Thej^  must  not  be  separated  from  each 
other,  and  cannot  be  separated.  "We  are  necessitated  to 
think  morally  and  act  rationally ;  by  which,  however,  it  is 
by  no  means  said  that  all  thinking  is  moral,  or  all  acting 
rational.  That  is  determined  by  the  relation  into  which  we 
enter,  of  our  own  free  choice,  regarding  the  truth,  as  also  by 
the  extent  to  which  reason  and  conscience  accept  the  truth. 

Now,  since  reason  and  conscience  capacitate  us  for  the 
truth,  for  its  apprehension  and  its  transference  into  life, 
they  require  the  truth,  both  for  us  and  of  us.  "With  the 
capacity  for  it  is  closely  connected  its  need,  and  only 
when  man  has  abandoned  the  morally  earnest  use  of  his 
reason,  and  foolishly  and  wilfully  separated  himself  from 
the  impulses  and  requirements  of  his  conscience,  can  he 
become  insensible  of  this  need,  and,  as  a  beggar,  who 
insanely  imagines  himself  to  be  a  king,  be  proud  in  the 
rags  of  his  povert}^  or  he  can  substitute,  in  fanaticism, 
falsehood  and  unwisdom  for  the  truth. 

Hence,  whatever  comports  with  reason  and  conscience 
must  spring  from  the  truth,  and  only  the  whole  truth  can 
satisfy  reason  and  conscience.     Reasonableness  and  neces- 


114  THE    BREMEN   LECTURES 

sary  assent  of  conscience  form  the  standard  of  truth,  and 
by  this  standard  must  be  measured  the  thoughts  of  men, 
as  well  as  that  which  calls  itself  a  divine  revelation. 

It  is  something  grand,  this  outfit  of  man  for  the  truth, 
this  endowment  which  in  reality  makes  him  the  lord  and 
centre-point  of  the  world,  —  this  idea  of  the  truth,  which 
is  implanted  in  his  spirit  both  as  possession  and  as  need, 
and  which  on  its  passage  through  the  conscience  immedi- 
ately announces  itself  as  the  life-determining  power.  An 
ineradicable  longing  after  truth  and  righteousness  per- 
vades the  spiritual  history  of  humanity ;  and  how  deeply 
the  importance  of  the  knowledge  of  the  truth  has  been  felt 
to  be,  we  may  learn  from  the  teaching  of  the  old  philoso- 
phers, that  philosophy  is  the  guide  to  a  virtuous  and  happy 
life,  a  doctrine  with  which  even  later  philosophers  essen- 
tially agree,  only  they  are  less  enthusiastic  and  have  their 
own  special  idea  of  the  matter.  As  an  electric  spark,  the 
expression  or  the  discovery  of  this  need  arouses  all  the 
depths  of  the  soul,  and  kindles  in  man,  for  the  first  time, 
a  correct  consciousness  of  his  destiny,  or  again  the  deep  and 
piercing  conviction,  that,  estranged  from  his  origin  and  his 
aim,  he  has  lost  himself,  —  his  best  part.  All  reflection 
of  men,  all  spiritual  labor,  all  seeking  for  knowledge  has 
in  this  its  point  of  departure  and  its  end,  and  it  can  be 
readily  understood  how  excited  must  be  the  conflict  when 
a  divine  revelation,  claiming  to  be  the  whole  and  only 
truth,  makes  its  appearance  and  yet  finds  only  a  limited 
recognition.  That  the  history  of  philosophy  shows  us  less 
a  development  and  constant  progress  in  the  knowledge  of 
tlie  truth  than  the  remarkable  phenomenon,  that  every 
new  system  demonstrates  the  untenableness  of  the  preced- 
ing one  and  rejects  it,  and  thus  incessantly  and  unweariedly 
commences  the  work  from  the  first,  —  that,  so  to  speak, 


REASON,    CONSCIENCE,    AND    REVELATION  115 

there  is  always  heard  the  noise  of  the  feet  of  those  who 
come  to  carry  out  the  new  system,  even  as  the  former  one 
was  borne  to  the  grave,  —  this  more  than  all  else  attests 
the  depth  of  the  need  of  the  truth,  and  indicates  how 
thoroughly  necessary  it  is  that  humanity  should  set  itself 
right  respecting  everything  which  claims  from  it  recog- 
nition as  the  truth,  and  so  respecting  divine  revelation. 

Now,  man  cannot  once  live,  cannot  understand  himself, 
without  the  truth,  even  though  he  is  compelled  to  substi- 
tute for  it  a  thought  of  his  own.  Only  by  the  truth  does 
man  come  to  his  majority.  Not  until  he  has  found  the 
truth  does  he  attain  to  peace  with  himself.  It  alone  can 
give  him  knowledge  of  himself,  of  the  ground  and  end  of 
his  being.  It  gives  him  the  direction,  the  line,  in  which 
not  only  he  must  proceed,  but  in  which  alone  he  can  freely 
and  without  hindrance  order  his  life.  The  truth  for  mar}, 
and  man  for  the  truth,  —  this  is  the  mutual  relation  in 
which  all  yearning  and  seeking  of  the  spirit  come  to  rest. 
Just  the  need  of  truth,  which  is  not  to  be  separated  from 
the  capacity  for  it,  attests  to  us,  that  we  have  only  then 
comprehended  ourselves  and  obtained  freedom  and  inde- 
pendence, when  we  have  found  the  truth  and  submitted  to 
it,  and  are  reproducing  the  same  as  righteousness  in  our 
lives.  The  truth,  and  outy  the  truth,  corresponds  to  our 
life ;  the  truth,  and  only  the  truth,  is  in  accordance  with 
reason,  is  reasonable. 

After  all  this,  we  must  now  confess  that,  with  our  outfit 
for  the  truth,  the  truth  itself  we  do  not  possess.  We 
have,  indeed,  a  conception  of  it,  but  not  the  truth  itself, 
the  content.  Reason  and  conscience  cannot  say,  I  am 
the  truth ;  as  little  can  they  say,  of  themselves  alone,  I 
have  the  truth  ;  but  this  they  can  and  ought  to  do,  to  seek 
the  truth,  and,  wherever  it  is  found,  accept  it.     The  truth 


116  THE    BREMEN   LECTURES 

is  above  us ;  it  must  come  into  us,  since  reason  and  con- 
science are  adapted  to  unite  with  it,  wherever  it  meets  us, 
otherwise  it  remains  external  to  us.  This  is  an  impor- 
tant result  of  the  knowledge  yet  farther  to  be  realized, 
that  with  the  capability  for  the  truth,  and  because  of  this 
capability,  we  bear  within  us  also  its  need.  If,  however, 
we  possess  these  two  things,  capability  and  need,  if  we 
have  even  but  a  conception  of  the  truth,  then  we  have  in 
this  an  exceedingly  important  benefit ;  namely,  the  assur- 
ance of  knowing  the  truth  when  it  meets  us,  even  as 
Adam,  on  awaking,  saw  the  helpmeet  which  God  had  made 
for  him,  and  said,  "  This  is  now  bone  of  my  bones,  and 
flesh  of  my  flesh."  We  shall  be  now,  in  some  measure, 
prepared  to  say  what  must  be  the  nature  of  the  truth,  pro- 
vided it  is  the  truth.  We  are  fortunately  not  under  the 
necessity,  therefore,  of  stopping  short  with  the  question 
suggested  by  vanity,  indolence,  despair,  levit}^,  or  frivolity, — 
what  is  truth  ?  —  as  though  it  were  in  appearance  wise  to 
withhold  a  farther  use  of  the  reason,  a  continuation  of  that 
which  was,  perhaps,  never  earnestly  undertaken,  a  thorough 
conscientious  investigation,  from  such  questions  ;  as  though 
no  one  could  know  the  truth  and  distinguish  it  from  im- 
posture and  delusion.  And  even  though  up  till  now  the 
truth  had  escaped  the  inquiring  human  intelligence,  still 
it  would  be  an  incalculable  advantage  to  be  able  in  every 
case  to  say,  this  is  not  the  truth,  this  cannot  be  it ;  or, 
from  the  fruitlessness  of  all  endeavor  to  have  come  to  the 
conclusion  of  Plato,  illogical  yet  sustained  by  experience, 
that  the  truth,  or  at  least  the  whole  truth,  cannot  be  ob- 
tained except  by  revelation. 

Let  us  hold  this  fast :  man  can  know  the  truth.  And 
now  we  ask,  how  can  he  know  it?  what  is  its  sign?  by 
what  does  it  prove  itself  to  our  reason  ?  by  what  does  it 


REASON,    CONSCIENCE,    AND    REVELATION  117 

bind  the  conscience  to  its  moral  realization  in  righteous- 
ness? It  must  be  a  clear,  distinct  sign,  one  visible  and 
plain,  without  the  -eyes  being  armed  by  art  and  science,  a 
sign  to  all,  to  the  educated  and  the  uneducated,  to  the 
laborers  in  spiritual  matters,  and  also  the  laborers  of  the 
field.  Because  the  truth  is  for  all,  it  must,  if  it  is  not 
apprehended  by  all,  jet  be  to  all  apprehensible.  Only  wil- 
ful blindness  can  be  allowed  to  be  incapable  of  discerning 
it,  and  it  must  be  qualified  to  lay  a  well-founded  claim  to 
universal  recognition,  even  when  this  is  refused  it. 

Plato  says  somewhere,  —  and  in  this  sajdng  resembles 
that  man  in  other  respects  so  much  his  inferior  of  whom 
we  read,  he  prophesied  because  he  was  high-priest  that 
year,  —  Plato  says,  man  is  the  measure  of  all  things;  and 
this  expression  finds  its  richest  and  deepest  application  in 
the  question  touching  the  sign  of  the  truth.  Afl3nity  is  the 
proof  of  the  truth.  This  is  its  sign :  that  in  it  we  find, 
and  in  a  much  higher  sense  than  man  does  in  woman,  that 
which  is  wanting  to  us,  the  necessary  complement  of  our 
being.  Only  with  the  truth  and  in  it  does  man  find  him- 
self; for  it  is  this  he  seeks,  and  this  wanting,  the  whole 
content  and  meaning  of  his  life  is  wanting  also.  There- 
fore, this  will  be  the  sign  of  the  truth :  that  it  opens  man's 
e3"es  respecting  himself  (as  also  in  this  "  opening  of  the 
eyes  "  is  the  great,  seductive  power  of  falsehood  and  sin, 
which  substitute  themselves  for  truth).  It  will  help  him  to 
an  understanding  of  himself,  and  of  all  the  mysterious 
ruling  in  the  depths  of  his  personality.  In  the  light  of 
the  truth,  an  understanding  of  his  needs,  a  knowledge  of 
his  worth,  and  clearness  as  to  his  capabilities  and  ends, 
will  be  gained  by  him.  The  truth  gives  me  the  knowledge 
of  that  which  I  have  in  myself.  It  accordingly  offers  it- 
self directly  as  the  ideal,  to  behold  and  become  wedded  to 


118  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

which  was  the  unstilled  longing  of  my  soul.  Now,  first, 
do  I  know  who  I  am,  what  I  am,  for  what  I  am?  not 
merely,  I  have  found  it,  but,  I  have  found  m3'self !  is  the 
knowledge  and  confession  of  him  who  has  apprehended  the 
truth.  The  original  affinity  between  ourselves  and  the 
truth,  its  being  so  completely  human,  and  yet  so  sublime 
that  it  can  be  characterized  only  as  divine,  —  thus,  its 
divine-human  quality,  as  it  is  to  be  called,  —  this  is  the 
self-evidence  which  the  truth  furnishes  to  him  who  desires 
it.  Its  signature  is,  all  human  and  yet  all  divine.  As 
long  as  we  are  destitute  of  this  complement  of  our  being, 
we  are  not,  and  do  not  feel  ourselves  to  be,  free  and  well ; 
we  know  of  nothing  truly  satisfying  with  ourselves  to  take 
hold  of,  and  as  little  with  all  that  we  have  gained  or  met 
of  spiritual  and  material  possessions.  From  this  seem- 
ingly free  but  in  reality  enslaving  lawlessness  and  inse- 
curity, from  this  degrading  independency,  we  would  be 
absolved.  The  truth  is  freedom,  light,  atmosphere,  and 
life  for  man ;  and,  in  this  particular,  He  whom  his  church 
calls  the  God-man  is  at  least  right  when  he  says  :  ye  shall 
know  the  truth,  and  the  truth  shall  make  you  free.  Man  is 
the  measure  of  all  things ;  truth  is  the  standard  of  man,  — 
man  also  is  the  standard  of  truth. 

This  explains  why  it  is  that  there  dwells  in  man  an 
irresistible  longing  after  the  truth,  —  and  yet  a  deep-rooted 
shyness  of  it.  We  love  and  desire  it,  for  it  is  our  life  ;  we 
fear  and  flee  it,  for  it  is  our  death  as  well.  This  explains 
what  is  meant  by  the  tradition  about  the  veiled  image  at 
Sais,  that  the  man  who  raises  the  veil  must  die.  He  who 
would  lift  it  for  mortals  must  have  the  hardihood  and 
power  to  swallow  up  death  in  life.  Perhaps,  in  the  conflict 
concerning  the  truth,  both  this  seeking  and  fleeing  are 
mirrored.     It   must   appear.     We   are  no  longer  children 


REASON,    CONSCIENCE,    AND    REVELATION  119 

in  the  sense  in  which  a  child  carries  in  unconscious  and 
involuntary  helplessness  the  prophecy  of  future  freedom 
and  independency.  Our  seeking  for  truth  is  conditioned, 
in  great  part,  by  the  fact,  that  we  find  ourselves,  by  our 
own  fault,  afar  off  from  the  light,  are  wandering  in  the 
most  complicated  waj^s  of  error,  and  our  thinking  and 
living  do  not  correspond  with  the  truth.  It  is  not  merely 
mistakes  and  errors  that  truth  must  correct  in  us.  Be- 
sides reason  and  conscience,  we  have  a  will,  which  goes 
its  own  way,  and  readily  subjects  itself  to  neither  reason 
nor  conscience  nor  the  truth,  and  since  the  case  so  stands 
in  experience,  that  we  and  our  entire  race  are  governed 
less  by  reason  and  conscience  than  by  the  will,  the 
arbitrary  will,  we  do,  indeed,  for  the  sake  of  reason  and 
conscience  desire  the  truth,  for  we  feel  that  it  alone  is  life 
and  freedom  ;  but  we  fear  it,  for  it  brings  us  death.  We  can, 
cei-tainly,  think  of  the  truth  as  blessed  life  ;  but  we  always 
experience  it  first  as  living  law,  —  spirit  and  power,  —  which 
annihilates  whatever  does  not  adjust  itself  to  it.  Because, 
however,  man,  the  measure  of  all  things,  is  also  the  measure 
of  truth,  in  this  is  the  self-evidence  of  the  truth,  that  it 
slays,  though  it  is  the  life,  —  nay,  just  because  it  is  the  life. 
One  thing  more.  All  that  has  been  said  thus  far  leads 
us  to  the  necessity  of  a  self-revelation,  a  self-attestation 
of  the  truth.  We  have  a  conception  of  it,  its  idea  and  the 
desire  for  it,  —  thus  everything  but  just  the  truth  itself. 
It  must  be  more  than  idea,  —  it  is  the  ideal,  whose  idea  we 
bear  within  us;  and  it  must,  again,  be  more  than  an  ideal 
in  the  customary  sense  of  an  imagined  object  or  an  idol,  — 
it  must  be  reality,  actuality.  This  is  the  desire  of  our 
souls.  The  truth  must  prove  that  it  is  the  truth,  by  being 
actual.  An  idea  in  itself  can  be  only  appearance,  an 
error,  or  the  product  of  a  diseased  egoism  ;  nay,  we  cannot, 


.1120  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

from  the  fact  that  we  have  apprehended  and  proven  some- 
thing to  be  necessary,  say  that  it  also  actually  exists;  as  a 
recent  philosopher  has  rightly  objected  to  this  favorite  sup- 
position, —  the  bridge  from  logical,  rational  necessity  to 
actuality  has  not  yet  been  discovered.  Does  the  truth 
which  we  seek  actually  exist,  then  it  must  manifest  itself 
as  reality,  as  reality  it  must  at  some  point  enter  into  our 
life  or  meet  us. 

And  indeed  not  as  a  thing,  an  unconscious  existence,  be 
it  even  a  combination  of  natural  phenomena  called  natural 
laws,  or  the  unity  of  the  worlds  and  the  like,  but  as  per- 
sonality. For  only  a  personality  is  of  equal  rank  with 
man ;  to  it  he  can  wed  himself ;  in  it  he  can  find  himself 
and  his  proper  thou  ;  only  it  is  in  affinity  with  him ;  —  a 
life-dispensing,  life-emitting,  and  even  to  all  the  world 
life-imparting  personality,  this  the  truth  must  be.  For  so 
alone  does  it  stand  by  the  side  of  man  as  the  bridegroom, 
suing  for  his  free  and  yet  necessary  love,  stand  as  the 
source  of  life  and  father  to  him.  Everything  else,  the 
whole  world  and  its  individual  existences,  the  entire  sum 
of  natural  laws,  even  of  those  yet  undiscovered,  is  inferior 
to  him.  All  this  must  lie  at  his  feet ;  to  it  —  the  world  — 
he  cannot  give  himself,  otherwise  he  would  not  so  long 
already  have  sought  the  truth  outside  of  and  above  the 
world.  In  a  word,  the  truth  must  be  God  himself,  a  living, 
personal  God,  and  God  himself  must  be  the  truth,  and 
God  must  be  reality,  not  conception  or  thought,  and  God 
must  reveal  himself;  for  it  belongs,  as  we  saw,  to  the 
nature  of  the  truth,  that  it  reveal  itself,  or  we  should  have 
it  only  in  thought,  i.  e.,  we  should  in  reality  be  eternally 
far  from  it,  since  our  thoughts  do  not  possess  creative 
power  and  divine  prerogative.     Therefore  the  quick,  sure- 


AND    REVELATION  121 

sighted  Greeks  designated  the  truth  by  a  word  ^  which  refers 
to  the  fundamental  conception  of  revelation.  In  the 
domain  of  philosophy  we  shall  have  to  inquire  how  much 
truth  men  have  thought  of,  and  by  thinking  have  dis- 
covered ;  in  that  of  religion,  how  much  truth  they  have 
lived,  and  in  living  have  possessed.  How  much  truth  they 
have  reproduced  as  righteousness  in  life,  of  this,  history 
would  inform  us,  if  it  did  not  show  us  rather  the  op- 
posite. 

They  are  grand  requirements,  these  which  reason  and 
conscience  make,  —  requirements,  such  as,  if  they  are 
complied  with,  put  before  the  eyes  a  majesty,  and  promise 
a  sea  of  glory  to  him  who  is  able  to  endure  the  glance 
thereof.  If,  however,  they  are  not  complied  with,  then  we 
are  doomed  to  submission,  and  there  is  nothing  left  us  but 
either  the  sorrow  of  the  world,  in  which  we  commiserate 
ourselves,  and  that  we  exist,  and  the  world,  and  that  it 
exists,  as  an  eternally  incomprehensible,  aimless  matter  of 
fact,  —  only  a  sort  of  slow  suicide ;  or  else  a  frivolous 
Epicureanism  and  Sadduceeism,  with  the  device,  Let  us 
eat  and  drink,  for  to-morrow  we  die.  Renounce  life,  — 
enjoy  life ;  between  these  two  poles,  as  caprice  and  taste 
might  dictate,  humanity  would  have  to  move. 

Let  me  set  before  jon,  briefly,  the  historical  relation  of 
man  to  the  truth,  —  how  much  of  it  he  has  anticipated  or 
discovered, — that  we  may  be  able  also  by  means  of  this 
historical  standard  to  measure  the  claims  of  divine  revela- 
tion, as  we  possess  it  in  the  Holy  Scriptures. 

1  'AA^^eia,  etymologically  tTuit  which  ia  not  concealed.  —  Tr, 


122  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 


IL 


At  one  or  the  other  of  those  two  poles  —  life-renuncia- 
tion and  life-enjoyment — humanity  has  more  than  once 
arrived.  India,  the  land  of  treasures,  has  produced  also 
the  doctrine,  that  nothing  is  the  only  truth,  and  man 
must  renounce  all,  to  prepare  himself  for  transition  into 
this  only  blessed  nothing.  It  is  the  philosophy  of 
despair,  which  there,  as  with  us,  in  the  poets  of  melan- 
choly, confirms  the  saying.  What  is  a  man  profited  if  he 
shall  gain  the  world?  Still,  the  instinct  of  self-preserva- 
tion is  too  strong  in  man  for  him  not  to  prefer,  if  he  can 
find  nothing  better,  to  recompense  himself  with  the  enjoy- 
ment of  the  present.  Therefore  we  find  in  all  nations,  at 
all  times,  in  all  places,  those  who  prize  this  as  the  only 
wisdom :  enjoy  the  moment,  enjoy  life.  This  also  is  a 
philosophy  of  despair,  and  at  limes  one  can  query,  which 
moves  humanity  more  powerfull}^,  the  seeking  of  enjoy- 
ment, or  the  earnest  though  unsatisfactory  search  after 
truth  ?  This,  however,  we  know :  the  philosophy  of  despair, 
as  also  that  of  enjoyment,  just  because  it  is  the  philosophy 
of  despair,  does  not  bear  on  itself  the  sign  of  the  truth, 
adaptation  to  humanity ;  and  especially  do  we  pronounce 
the  latter,  without  hesitation,  to  be  morally  objectionable. 
We  can  exclude  them  forthwith  from  the  answer  to  the 
question,  how  much  truth,  reason,  and  conscience  have 
found,  since  neither  of  them  comes  legitimately  within  it. 
By  so  doing,  however,  we  have  excluded  also  both  the  old 
and  the  new  materialism,  to  which  it  is  necessary  to  prove, 
at  the  outset,  that  man  is  something  else  than  an  animal, 
though  on  the  scale  of  animals  the  highest  representative. 
With  him,  who,  like  the  materialists,  has  lost  his  self-con- 
sciousness, there  is  no  disputing.     It  is  vain  and  superflu- 


REASON,    CONSCIENCE,    AND    REVELATION  123 

ous,  after  that,  to  defend  himself  and  his  human  rights, 
and  we  on  our  part  have  for  this  class  of  reasoners  only 
that  old  and  often  verified  saying:  These  speak** evil  of 
those  things  which  they  know  not ;  but  what  they  know 
naturall}^,  as  brute  beasts,  in  those  things  they  corrupt 
themselves. 

By  this  exclusion  we  have  already  gained  much.  The 
spiritual  life  remaining  for  us  to  consider,  has  something 
in  it  more  human,  and  struggles  up  nearer  to  the  light. 
We  enter  upon  a  field  where  discussion  is  easier,  where 
the  battle  is  only  the  forerunner,  and,  indeed,  the  condition 
of  peace.  Let  us,  however,  beforehand,  impress  upon  our 
own  memories  the  words  which  one  of  the  world's  own 
prophets  has  written :  "As  long  as  man  strives,  he  errs." 

It  would  be  strange  if  at  least  intimations  of  the  truth 
had  not,  at  all  times,  made  themselves  known  to  men. 
Before  Christianity,  the  religion  of  revelation,  summoned 
thinking  man  to  join  himself  to  revelation,  or  to  wage  war 
with  it,  the  thought  or  rather  the  knowledge  everywhere 
meets  us,  that  the  truth  occupies  a  divine  relation  to  man  ; 
that  the  Deity  is  one  with  the  truth,  and  that  the  knowl- 
edge of  the  Deity  first  teaches  man  to  understand  himself 
and  the  world.  For  this  reason,  man  cannot  live  his  full 
life  without  religion ;  and  theology  has  ever  been  that 
which  characterizes  the  diffeient  systems  of  knowing  and 
of  knowledge,  distinguishing  them  from  each  other.  In 
the  popular  belief  of  the  ancients,  as  in  their  philosophy 
so  far  as  it  did  not  lapse  into  the  doctrines  of  renunciation 
or  enjoj^ment,  we  find  throughout,  in  confirmation  of  the 
knowledge  gained  by  us,  this  striving  which  goes  beyond 
the  world ;  and  in  all  decisions  respecting  God  and  the 
divine,  different  as  they  are,  we  find  yet  this  in  common, 
that  the  world  and  humanity  are  dependent  on  him,  and 


124  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

can  find  only  in  this  association  the  full  development  of 
life.  Further,  we  see  it  confirmed,  that  the  truth  in  an 
ideal  sense  must  be  human ;  in  the  popular  belief  the  gods 
were  fashioned  into  imitations  of  men,  with  their  good  and 
bad  qualities,  while  in  the  philosophy,  and  by  the  philoso- 
ph}^,  the  knowledge  of  a  vast  distance  between  what  is 
divine  and  what  is  really  human  was  made  current.  This 
also  is  common  to  both  the  popular  belief  and  the  philoso- 
phy of  the  ancients :  that  the  life  this  side  of  death  is  not 
the  whole  of  life,  nay,  that  it  forms  a  barrier  to  knowledge, 
the  present  not  coinciding  entirely  with  the  truth ;  that 
beyond  this  life  we  shall  have  a  look  into  the  reality  of  the 
truth  ;  that  there,  also,  the  truth  —  the  rule  of  the  gods, 
or  of  the  Deity — will  reveal  itself  in  the  judgment  of 
individuals.  Such  intimations  and  perceptions,  such  out- 
lines of  religion,  we  will  not  embrace  under  the  apostle's 
saying,  that  this  world's  wisdom  is  foolishness  with  God. 
He  himself,  with  a  certain  predilection  that  way,  returns 
to  it  when,  e.  g.,  in  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles,  he  makes  use 
of  it,  saying,  "  certain  also  of  your  own  poets  have  said, 
We  are  also  his  offspring ;  for  in  him  we  live  and  move  and 
have  our  being ; "  or  when,  in  the  Epistle  to  the  Romans, 
he  appeals  to  it,  "  Who,  knowing  the  judgment  of  God, 
that  they  which  commit  such  things  are  worthy  of  death." 
To  this  belong  expressions  such  as  that  of  Aristophanes, 
"Piety  preserves  all;"  the  saying  of  Plutarch  in  his 
treatise  on  superstition,  "  The  infidel  has  no  belief  in  the 
gods ;  the  superstitious  man  would  fain  have  none,  but  he 
believes  against  his  will,  for  he  is  afraid  not  to  believe ; " 
and  the  old  saying,  "  Godless  and  without  God  is  polythe- 
ism." A  peculiar  charm  is  connected  with  these  expres- 
sions, as  with  all  intimations  and  prophecies,  as  with  all 
germs.     There  is  perceived  in  them  that  freshness,  that 


REASON,    CONSCIENCE,    AND    REVELATION  125 

originality,  that  earnest  striving,  which  have  become  so 
strange  to  a  race  growing  old.  We  are  captivated  by  the 
Platonic  doctrine  of  ideas,  that  at  the  basis  of  all  visi- 
bility, of  all  manifoldness  of  appearances,  lies  an  idea  in 
real  existence,  thus  an  actual  ideal ;  that  all  ideas,  which 
form  the  original  ground  of  the  phenomenal  world,  —  so, 
namely,  that  the  latter  is  only  a  copy  of  the  original  pic- 
ture, —  culminate  in  the  idea  of  the  good,  of  the  perfect, 
which  coincides  with  the  Deit3^  This  doctrine  is  a  won- 
derfully bold  attempt  to  apprehend  that  which  lies  be- 
yond the  present,  and  still  is  present.  Socrates  and 
Plato,  who  reached  the  highest  point,  have  not  concealed 
from  themselves,  that  the  whole  truth  in  its  divine-human 
form  they  do  not  have  ;  and  Socrates,  who  refers  to  some- 
thing that  looks  like  revelation,  complains :  he  held  it  to 
be  the  greatest  good  fortune  to  know  the  will  of  the  gods  ; 
but  he  does  not  believe  it  can  be  ascertained  by  the  con- 
clusions of  reason,  and  he  therefore  recommends  divina- 
tion, the  art  of  fathoming  the  will  of  the  gods  from  its 
signs.  And  this  wisdom  has  never  become  the  world's 
wisdom,  the  common  property  of  the  world  and  of  its 
sages. 

When  Christianity  entered  the  world,  the  world  had  not 
yet  found  the  truth,  had  even  lost  the  beginnings  of  this 
knowlege.  The  popular  belief  of  the  old  nations  had 
broken  down,  —  unable  either  to  endure  the  corrections 
of  reason,  such  as  Socrates,  Plato,  and  even  Aristotle, 
attempted,  or  to  overcome  the  influences  of  a  skeptical, 
doubt-seeking  philosophy.  Greece  and  Rome  were  sighing 
under  a  universal  religious  bankruptc}^,  which  for  its  preser- 
vation was  only  able  to  build  a  pantheon,  an  asylum  for  all 
the  gods  of  all  nations,  although  Aristotle  had  already  ac- 
cented as  a  requirement  of  reason  the  unity  of  God.     Phi- 


126  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

losophy  was  not,  as  formerly,  advancing  in  a  constant 
correction  and  deepening  of  knowledge,  but  had  fallen  a 
prey  to  skepticism,  to  greedy  doubt  and  gloomy  despair. 
The  entire  sum  of  the  spiritual  life,  as  far  as  it  had  not  pos- 
sessed itself  of  a  certain  ingeniousness  of  the  moment  and 
for  this  world,  had  become  a  great  maze  of  confusion,  and 
it  is  more  than  an  accident,  it  is  a  world-historical  circum- 
stance, that  over  against  the  One  and  the  only  One  who  of 
all  men  ever  dared  to  say,  "  I  am  the  Truth,"  Pilate,  his 
judge,  must  serve  as  Folly,  with  his  question,  as  expressive 
of  self-suflSciency  as  of  despair  :  What  is  truth  ? 

Yet,  all  the  while,  humanity  knew  not  and  had  not  the 
truth.  Then  Christianity  made  its  appearance  with  world- 
conquering  plans  and  —  it  must  on  all  sides  be  conceded  — 
with  such  world-conquering  power,  that  to  this  hour  it  is 
the  only  religion  which  has  a  prospect  for  the  future.  But 
as  formerly  not  even  the  outlines  of  the  truth  were  held 
fast,  so  it  cannot  be  regarded  now  as  so  strange,  that  in 
view  of  the  seemingly  extravagant  claims  of  the  truth, 
humanity  again,  and  only  the  more  zealously,  sought  it  with 
itself,  and  wished  to  find  it  without  the  religion  of  revela- 
tion. A  spiritual  war  was  kindled,  which  still  continues, 
and  which  cannot  be  fought  out  until  one  or  the  other  of 
tJie  parties  is  annihilated.  What  of  truth  humanity  can 
find  without  a  self-revelation  of  God  must  now  appear. 
For  it  is  not  here  revelation  against  revelation,  nor  philoso- 
phy against  philosophy,  but  that  which  calls  itself  a  revela- 
tion, and  which  can  so  little  be  a  product  of  the  thinking 
spirit,  that  some  have  wished  to  consider  it  the  ofi'spring  of 
a  morbid  imagination  or  of  a  saga  inventing  the  fantastic, 
—  this  is  set  against  all  the  religion  and  philosophy  of  men, 
or.  since  no  other  religion  can  endure  in  the  presence  of 
Christianity,  it  is  at  last  this  against  all  philosophy.     (We 


REASON,    CONSCIENCE,    AND    REVELATION  127 

purposely  refrain  from  saying,  faith  is  against  knowledge, 
as  that  is  a  wholly  imaginary  opposition).  If  Judaism  had 
not  produced  such  works  of  genius  as  did  the  Greeks,  be- 
cause it  needed  them  not,  Christianity  and  its  opponents 
now  led  forth  forces  in  a  human  point  of  view  equally  great. 

What,  then,  has  the  world  at  this  time  to  offer  as  the 
truth  ?  or  does  it  stand  perhaps  all  the  while  yet  before  the 
question.  What  is  truth?  "As  long  as  man  sti'ives,  he 
errs,"  —  this  is  the  sum,  which  an  authority  in  the  world  has 
estimated.  After  a  serious  effort  of  thought,  reason  has 
always  been  forced  to  correct  itself,  and  that  it  could  not 
rest  without  perpetual  correction  is  an  evidence  of  its  eleva- 
tion and  nobility.  It  is  also  an  evidence  of  the  spiritual  depth 
of  our  German  nation  and  of  its  special  mission  for  the  truth, 
that  we  have  always  taken  upon  ourselves  the  correction  of 
systems,  as  well  as,  for  the  most  part,  the  formation  of  them. 
Yet  the  truth  cannot  be  found  where  one  system  is  de- 
stroying another.  The  philosophy  which  was  unwilling 
to  go  forward  in  theism  —  from  the  recognition  of  one 
living  God  to  the  God  of  revelation  in  Christ  —  fell 
away  to  deism,  and  strove  in  vain  to  make  men  compre- 
hend a  God  who  had  ceased  working  and  grown  old,  and 
as  this  view  did  not  meet  all  the  demands  of  reason, 
philosophy  gave  way  to  pantheism  and  was  dumb.  We 
may  also  regard  pantheism  as  now  set  aside,  partly  by 
materialism,  and  partly  by  the  decisive  advances  towards 
theism,  which  we  greet  as  the  early  dawn  of  a  Christian 
philosophy  ;  yet  the  forms  have  not  taken  exact  shape,  and 
the  present  yet  stands  before  the  question,  What  is  truth? 
science  giving  to  it  no  ansiuer. 

It  is  in  point  to  show  our  race  that,  after  such  results  of 
thousands  of  years'  labor,  it  is  j^et  well  worth  the  trouble 
earnestly  to   inquire  whether  the   truth   can   properly  be 


128  THE   BREMEN    LECTURES 

found  except  by  its  self-revelation.  Then  alone  has  the 
erring  endeavor  of  man  an  end.  But  as  this  ever  erring 
endeavor  has  for  nearly  two  thousand  years  derived  always 
new  impulse  from  opposition  to  revelation,  and  has  lived 
by  opposition,  so  now  it  persists  in  the  same.  Without 
any  bond  of  union,  save  that  of  denial,  without  being 
conscious  of  any  systematic  basis,  it  now  summons  to  the- 
conflict  the  entire  sum  and  product  of  human  knowledges* 
and  investigation,  as  aggregated  in  the  present  stage  of 
culture.  The  collective  consciousness  of  the  civilized 
world  —  if  such  a  one  could  be  extracted  —  represents, 
it  is  said,  at  least  one  stage  of  the  truth,  and  must  be 
permitted  to  require  that  Christianity  put  itself  in  unison 
with  it,  instead  of  the  reverse.  Independently  of  its  moral 
perversion,  this  reminds  us  suspiciously  of  pantheism, 
abandoned  now  in  the  name  of  reason,  which  taught  that 
God  becomes  conscious  of  himself  in  the  world,  and  in 
the  gradual  manner  of  its  development.  Further,  natural 
science,  on  the  ever-increasing  height  of  close  inquiry,  in 
the  discovery  and  exploration  of  the  always  unapprehended 
laws  of  nature,  is,  according  to  the  latest  view,  to  teach 
us  the  truths  to  which  our  entire  being  is  subject ;  since 
some  have  gone  so  far,  e.  g.,  as  to  make  of  the  ethical  and 
religious  question  concerning  the  immortality  of  the  soul 
a  question  of  physiology,  of  physics.  An3^thing  else  than 
the  unbending  course  of  nature  is  not  to  be  affirmed  ;  and 
this  reminds  one  suspiciously  of  deism,  which  bound  the 
Creator  so  mechanically  to  his  creation,  that  he  remained 
at  best  but  bound  and  regulated  force,  no  longer  spirit  and 
freedom  and  life.  And  yet  the  protest  against  deism  in 
the  name  of  reason  has  been  admitted. 

We  have  arrived  at  the  deciding  point.     In  the  name  of 
reason    and   conscience    the    attempts   to   establish    and 


REASON,    CONSCIENCEj    AND    REVELATION  129 

express  the  truth  have  been  set  aside.  In  no  system  did 
man  find  himself  and  his  being,  for  which  there  is  rest  only  in 
God.  The  present  stage  of  culture  can  of  itself,  and  even  for 
our  age  alone,  as  little  be  the  truth,  as  any  one  member  or 
the  aggregate  of  our  race  can  be  the  truth.  Does  there, 
then,  exist  any  right  to  protest  in  the  name  of  reason  and 
conscience  against  divine  revelation,  as  it  has  furnished 
for  itself  its  self-evidence  in  the  Sacred  Scriptures?  This 
brings  us  to  the  chief  and  concluding  point  of  our  dis- 


cussion 


in. 

When,  at  present,  not  only  in  the  name  of  reason,  but 
also  in  that  of  conscience,  protest  is  made  against  the 
religion  of  the  Bible,  —  for  it  is  that  alone  with  which  our 
question  has  to  do,  —  it  must  not  be  overlooked,  that  the 
conscience  in  man  and  its  significancy  were  first,  so  to 
speak,  discovered  by  that  religion.  The  Romans,  the 
people  of  justice,  knew  it  as  the  consciousness  of  guilt. 
So  also  the  Greeks,  who,  e.  g.  Plato,  conceived  of  it 
as  an  exercise  of  the  memory,  while  more  lately  it  was 
spoken  of  as  a  consciousness  preceding,  following,  and 
judging  of  the  character  of  actions,  and  was  treated  as  an 
expression  of  the  understanding.^  But  that  it  furnishes  a 
measure  for  the  truth,  this  first  became  clear  when — with- 
out special  show,  as  something  self-evident  —  it  was  ex- 
pressed by  the  apostle :  "By  manifestation  of  the  truth, 
we  commend  ourselves  to  everj^  man's  conscience  in  the 
sight  of  God."  The  appeal  to  conscience  we  find  first  in 
the  Holy  Scriptures  of  the  New  Testament.  There  it 
appears  as  bearer  of  the  religious  need  ;  there,  accordingly, 

*  Comp.  my  bibliach-theologischeB  "Worterbuch  der  nentestamenlichen  GracitSt, 
p.  184  ff.  J 


130  THE    BREMEN   LECTURES 

it  has  to  confirm  and  attest  the  truth  of  the  revelation  of 
salvation,  by  which  this  need  is  met  and  satisfied.  In  the 
conscience  man  is  no  longer,  as  with  the  Greeks  and 
Romans,  merely  his  own  witness,  but  the  New  Testament 
emphasizes  this,  that  in  it  he  is  to  himself  a  witness  of  God. 
And  ever^^where  this  knowledge  is  now  accepted  as  a 
literally  correct  and  profound  view  of  the  truth.  The 
New  Testament  it  is  that  has  given  humanity  on  this  point 
its  first  understanding  of  itself,  and  since,  as  we  saw  at 
the  beginning,  it  is  the  peculiarity  of  the  truth  to  acquaint 
man  with  himself,  this,  to  go  no  further,  speaks  strongly 
for  the  truth  of  a  revelation  which,  as  a  revelation  of  the 
truth,  addresses  itself  to  the  conscience,  and  so  not  only 
voluntarily  subjects  itself  to  the  judgment  of  men,  but 
requires  the  same,  and  even  points  out  the  unknown 
tribunal  before  which  alone  it  can  be  judged. 

But  does  divine  revelation  actually,  as  it  professes, 
satisfy  the  requirements  of  conscientious  thinking  ?  Are  the 
contents  of  the  Bible  of  such  a  nature  that  a  self-revelation 
of  God  and  of  his  truth  can  be  perceived  in  them  ? 

We  have  already  seen  this,  that  it  would  be  unreasonable 
to  deny  the  possibility,  nay,  the  necessity  of  a  self-revela- 
tion of  God.  The  first  question  then  is  only,  whether  a 
particular  revelation  of  God,  a  difl'erent  one  from  that  in 
the  works  of  his  creation,  is  possible  and  requisite:  a 
different  one,  not  in  the  sense,  as  possibly  some  will  misun- 
derstand this,  that  God  now  represents  himself  in  a  way 
irreconcilable  with  the  natural  revelation,  but  a  different 
one,  in  the  sense  that  God  gives  us  to  know  something 
which  we  find  neither  in  nature  nor  in  ourselves.  That 
such  a  revelation  is  possible,  he  will  not  deny  who  recog- 
nizes in  the  being  of  God,  and  in  what  God  is  and  can  be 
to  us,  an  unsearchable  depth  of  riches.     That  God  l^oth  is 


REASON,    CONSCIENCE,    AND    REVELATION  131 

and  can  be  more  than  his  works  in  the  world  show  us, 
who  will  deny?  But  is  it  also  requisite ?  It  would  indeed 
be  requisite,  even  though  sin  had  never  entered  the  world. 
For  how  else  could  men  have  lived  in  God,  except  by  a 
continual  intercourse  of  God  with  them  ?  Only  revelation 
would  probably  not  have  been  then,  as  now  it  is,  something 
wholly  special.  It  would  have  been  something  naturally 
connected  with  the  normal  moral  development  of  life,  and 
would  certainly  also  have  come  in  a  different  way.  Now, 
however,  since  the  undeniable  fact  of  sin  has  caused  and  is 
constantly  causing  the  equally  undeniable  fact  of  estrange- 
ment from  God,  a  particular  revelation  must  appear  truly 
requisite  to  him  alone  who  with  pain  becomes  conscious  of 
this  estrangement,  and  this  consciousness  is  the  first  moral 
condition  for  a  right  understanding  of  revelation  and  of  the 
Sacred  Scriptures.  But  this  is  also  the  first  thing  attested 
by  our  conscience,  that  we  do  become  conscious  of  our  es- 
trangement from  God,  and  naturally  the  conscience  delivers 
this  testimony  with  special  emphasis  there  where  God 
meets  us.  Not  this  became  originally  strange  to  us, 
whether  we  have  a  God  over  us.  That  is  clear  to  us  from 
the  fact  of  our  estrangement  from  him.  But  this  is  the 
knowledge  which  has  become  a  want,  —  what  kind  of  a 
God  we  have.  Therefore  that  a  God,  that  God  exists,  does 
not  need  to  be  revealed,  and  besides  is  nowhere  by  the  bear- 
ers of  revelation  in  the  Sacred  Scriptures  especially  taught. 
This  is  a  fact  of  our  self-consciousness,  to  which  it  cannot 
be  objected,  that  there  are  perhaps  still  heathen  nations  on 
so  low  a  grade  of  humanity  as  not  to  have  this  conscious- 
ness of  God.  There  are  also  civilized  men  who  have,  to  a 
gi'eat  degree  at  least,  lost  it,  and  in  either  case  we  recog- 
nize a  degradation,  a  degeneracy.  This,  however,  is  the 
effect  of  our  estrangement  from  God,  that,  inasmuch  as  we 


132  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

do  not  Qow  sink  the  roots  of  our  entire  life  in  him,  we  are 
not  in  a  condition  to  apprehend  from  our  consciousness  of 
him  his  being,  as  far  as  this  is  apprehensible  to  men.  We 
know  by  our  present  capability  altogether  too  little  of  God 
to  be  able  to  be  satisfied  therewith,  and  our  deepest  long- 
ing therefore,  rightly  understood,  goes  out  after  a  revela- 
tion of  God.  Thus  also  our  spiritual  vision  suffers  under 
the  effects  of  this  estrangement  from  God,  and  the  errors  of 
the  self-ruling  spirit  explain  themselves  from  its  obscura- 
tion. Just  as  little  does  the  conscience  tell  us  anything  of 
God  that  goes  beyond  the  consciousness  of  our  estrange- 
ment from  him.  For  just  in  this  stadium  is  the  conscious- 
ness of  distance  from  God.  Consequently  the  conscience 
cannot  give  us  nearer  information,  and  so,  right  here,  is 
apparent  how  fundamentally  erroneous  is  the  assertion  of 
the  leader  of  the  present  opposition  movement,  that  every 
tenet  of  the  Christian  faith  must  be  referred  back  to  a  dep- 
osition of  the  conscience.  Reason  and  conscience  must 
first  receive  new  contents  before  they  can  make  new  deposi- 
tions, and  for  obtaining  new  contents  there  is  left  no  other 
means  than  that  of  a  self-revelation  of  God. 

Such  a  revelation,  it  is  true,  can  by  no  means  be  a  logical 
or  natural  necessity.  We  can  claim  it  neither  on  the 
grounds  of  the  universal,  of  even  the  divine  reason,  nor  on 
the  grounds  of  justice.  In  view  of  our  being  by  our  own 
fault  far  from  God,  it  can  only  be  an  act  of  the  divine  free- 
dom, if,  perchance,  it  is  not  to  be  a  revelation  of  judgment. 
This  latter  alone  could  be  rightly  and  logically  proven 
and  conceived  of  as  a  necessity.  The  question  for  man, 
freezing  afar  from  God,  is  concerning  a  revelation  which 
teaches,  and  by  facts  convinces  liim,  that  he  has  a  God  dif- 
ferent from  what  he  could  expect.  So,  the  revelation  which 
is  to  give  us  God,  estranged  as  we  are  from  him,  as  the  open, 


REASON,    CONSCIENCE,    AND    REVELATION  133 

flowing  fountain  of  life,  can  be  only  a  determination  and  an 
act  of  the  divine  freedom,  and,  indeed,  of  God's  free  love, 
of  his  redeeming  grace.  This  must  be  the  character  of  a 
revelation,  such  as  alone  can  lead  the  human  race  estranged 
from  God  back  to  its  original  condition  and  forward  to  its 
original  aim.  The  question,  first  of  all,  is  not  respecting  an 
advance,  but  respecting  a  saving,  energetic  reaction.  This 
is  surely  nothing  unreasonable ;  only  it  is  something  con- 
trary to  all  the  expectations  and  conclusions  of  reason.  If 
we  find  the  same  God  from  whom  we  are  far  oflf  in  sin,  man- 
ifesting himself  to  us  as  holy  love,  condemning,  yet  saving 
us,  we  cannot  say,  this  is  a  diflerent  God  from  the  one  reason 
and  conscience  attest  to  us ;  but  we  must  say,  God  is  dif 
ferent  from  what  we  expected.  He  is  —  to  resume  here  an 
earlier  expression  —  more  than  truth,  he  is  grace  and  truth. 
He  is  our  death  and  yet  our  life ;  he  solves  the  insolvable 
riddle.  These  are  things  unfathomable  to  our  reason,  things 
of  which  the  conscience  has  no  intimation.  They  are  di- 
rectly the  opposite  of  all  original  unadulterated  depositions 
of  reason  and  conscience,  and  yet  not  against  reason  and 
conscience,  but  in  the  highest  degree  for  us.  A  morally 
unclear  generation,  to  which  sin  is  at  most  an  error  or  a 
result  of  defective  culture  ;  which  excuses  itself  and  there- 
fore believes  it  is  able  also  to  redeem  itself,  —  a  generation 
which  has  lost  the  feeling  for  the  significancy  of  sin,  can 
indeed  present  that  as  the  deposition  of  its  conscience 
which  it  did  not  find  in  itself,  but  borrowed  from  Christian- 
ity, namely,  that  God  is  love  ;  but  mark, —  it  is  forthwith  no 
longer  in  a  condition  to  keep  the  unity  of  God  uninjured  ; 
it  must  weaken  the  condemning,  slaying  force  of  the  truth 
of  God  ;  it  can  no  longer  say  of  its  God  of  love,  he  is  my 
death  and  yet  my  life.  And  herein  precisely,  as  we  have 
already  seen,  is  the  self-evidence  of  the  truth,  that  it  is 


134  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

both,  only  no  man  has  a  presentiment  how  both  are  at  the 
same  time  possible. 

Now  that  we  have  such  a  God,  that  God  wills  to  be  such 
a  God,  —  grace  and  truth,  —  for  the  world,  this  is  the  testi- 
mony of  the  Sacred  Scriptures  upon  his  revelation  ;  this  is 
what  Christianity,  as  a  religion  of  revelation,  offers  us. 
The  God  who  reveals  himself  to  our  race,  estranged  from 
him,  to  our  race,  wandering  far  from  its  source  of  life,  to 
bring  it  back  to  nearness  with  himself,  does  not  surrender 
himself,  as  all  depositions  of  man  persisting  in  being  far 
from  God  surrender  something  or  even  all  of  the  truth  of 
God,  to  restore  at  least  the  indispensable  appearance  of  a 
nearness  to  him.  God  surrenders  himself  only  in  a  certain 
sense,  and  yet  remains  what  he  is ;  he  remains  the  God  of 
the  sharpest  opposition  to  sin,  and  at  the  same  time  reveals 
himself  as  saving,  pardoning,  and  redeeming  love.  He  is 
the  God  of  atonement,  and  assuredly  not  of  an  atonement 
such  as  to  the  reason  left  to  itself  and  its  own  thinking, 
and  to  the  conscience  left  to  itself,  must  appear  alone  rea- 
sonable, and  yet  impossible,  namely,  an  atonement  which 
sinful  man  by  an  impossible  reparation  for  his  offences  re- 
establishes, —  the  fundamental  conception  of  atonement  with 
the  heathen  nations,  the  natural  expression  of  the  religious 
life  and  thinking,  —  but  he  is  the  God  of  atonement  in  the 
sense  that  he  himself,  in  the  place  of  men,  undertakes  their 
atonement,  that  he  takes  upon  himself  the  fulfilment  of  the 
inviolable  claims  of  justice  upon  men.  He  surrenders  not 
himself,  for  this  he  cannot  do,  without  surrendering  the 
truth.  Therefore  he  reveals  himself  as  a  consuming  fire. 
And  yet  he  does  surrender  himself,  and  becomes  substitute 
for  men.  And  since  this  has  happened,  he  has  entered  into 
a  new  actual  relation  to  men,  has  become  strength  and  life 
for  the  humanity  which  accepts  this  new  relation. 


REASON.    CONSCIENCE,    AND    REVELATION  135 

You  perceive  I  am  here  attempting  to  indicate  the  out- 
lines of  the  self-revelation  of  the  Triune  God,  of  the 
God  of  atonement.  Also  as  to  this  it  manifestly  holds 
good,  that  something  is  presented  which  does  not  con- 
tradict reason,  but  in  which  we  dimlj^  discern  a  wonder- 
fully deep  reasonableness,  since  in  this  way  only  is  a 
unison  possible  between  the  God  of  redeeming  revelation 
and  the  requirements  of  reason  and  conscience  touching 
the  truth.  But,  although  it  is  nothing  unreasonable,  it  is 
yet  something  so  far  exalted  above  all  expectations,  above 
all  conceptions,  above  all  attempts  to  apprehend  God  by 
the  laws  of  logical  necessit}-,  as  the  One  who  must  be  the 
God  of  atonement,  not  first  by  an  act  of  his  free  love,  but 
from  himself,  that  it  is  comprehensible  if,  to  this  hour,  we 
can  better  adore  than  fathom  this  self-revelation  of  God. 
A  twofold  mistake  is  committed  b}^  those  who  oppose  this 
truth.  First,  the  mistake  of  judging  of  this  self-revelation 
of  God  according  to  the  natural  law  of  the  numbers  three 
and  one,  without  perceiving  that  even  the  conception  of 
God  as  infinite  life,  nay,  even  the  weakening  of  this  con- 
ception to  that  of  unlimited  being,  escapes  our  idea,  so 
that  we  cannot  with  the  phj^sics  of  numbers  enter  into  the 
metaphysical,  into  that  which  lies  beyond  nature.  And 
such  being  the  case,  no  proposition  of  metaphysics,  nor 
in  general  of,  say,  a  mathematical,  or  of  a  physical  class, 
should  in  this  connection  be  expressed.  The  second  mis- 
take is  this,  that  what  should  be  regarded  as  the  human 
expression  of  a  miraculous  fact  is  set  up  and  assailed  not 
as  a  fact,  but  as  a  proposition  of  mathematics,  though  ac- 
cording to  a  divine  mathematics  it  does  stand  the  test. 
All  rational  opposition  must  start  from  an  investigation 
of  the  fact.  It  has  to  inquire,  Is  it  a  fact  at  present  cog- 
nizable, that  we  have  such  a  God  ?  To  the  facts  the  reason 
must  confine  itself,  and  by  these  correct  its  mistakes,  as 


136  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

well  as  enlarge  the  boundaries  of  its  knowledge.  And  this 
latter  is  far  more  the  object  of  revelation  than  the  former 
is  its  necessary  accompaniment.  The  opposition  in  the 
name  of  the  Christian  consciousness  must  deal  earnestly 
with  the  Christian  consciousness,  and  not  substitute  mathe- 
matics, natural  science,  and  the  like,  in  its  place.  Must 
the  reason  concede  that  God  can  reveal  himself,  must  it 
even  acknowledge  that  it  is  in  the  nature  of  God  to  reveal 
himself,  must  it  farther  acknowledge  that  a  revelation  of 
God,  the  effect  of  which  is  not  to  be  our  death,  can  be  only 
an  act  of  the  free  love  of  God,  an  act  of  his  grace, —  then  we 
must  by  the  most  earnest  and  conscientious  search  for  God 
make  the  test,  whether  we  so  find  God,  as  he  has  revealed 
himself.  For  the  consequence  of  the  self-revelation  of 
God  is  his  presence.  It  is  not  separate  items  of  knowledge, 
individual  notices,  after  the  importation  of  which  God 
withdraws  himself;  but  by  revelation  God  enters  into  our 
presence  and  becomes  the  life-element  of  the  man  whom  he 
meets,  as  water  is  the  element  of  the  fish.  Therein  must 
be  tested  the  correctness  of  the  knowledge  of  God  wliich  is 
connected  with  his  revelations.  Therein  is  presented  con- 
tinually the  actuality  and  truth  of  that  which  was  at  each 
time  imparted  to  the  first  receivers  of  the  revelations  of 
God, — that  this  something  which  abides  is  an  abiding 
divine  energy,  an  abiding  life;  and  if  man  has,  for  the 
apprehension  of  spirit  and  life,  a  capability  of  feeling 
which  differs  from  that  of  the  five  senses,  if  he  has  an 
ability  to  perceive  and  know  what  is  spiritual,  then  he  can 
discern,  in  the  presence  of  this  divine  revelation  which  has 
entered  into  time,  God  himself;  as,  indeed,  even  the 
common  consciousness  of  God  is  not  a  historical  notice, 
but  a  present  feeling  of  God  or  of  personal  estrangement 
from   him.     This  test  must  be   applied,  and   it  must  be 


REASON,    CONSCIENCE,    AND    REVELATION  137 

conceded,  that  he  who  in  this  proof  does  not  find  the 
amount  required  has  reason  rather,  on  account  of  the 
importance  of  the  matter,  to  doubt  his  proof,  than  the 
amount,  and  to  seek  the  mistake  rather  with  himself  than  on 
the  other  side.  Commonly,  however,  the  doubt  is  turned, 
for  no  sufficient  reason,  in  a  one-sided  manner  against 
divine  revelation.  So  also  it  must  be  admitted,  that, 
until  the  time  when  the  barriers  of  this  world  fall,  when 
the  destroyed  harmony  between  the  world  and  God  shall 
be  re-estabUshed,  the  Christian  consciousness,  or,  to  speak 
more  correctly,  the  personal  life  in  the  presence  of  God 
(the  "witness  of  the  Spirit")  furnishes  the  last  but  irref- 
ragable proof  for  him  who  is  requii'ed  to  find  proof.  Only 
this  we  can  concede  to  no  one,  that  the  facts  in  which  we 
live  are  unreasonable  and  against  conscience  ;  and  it  is  our 
great  and  serious  task  to  assert  and  promote  a  recognition 
of  this  truth,  so  far  at  least,  that  not  the  reason  but  at 
most  the  will  shall  contradict  it. 

One  thing,  however,  with  this  we  must  not  forget,  name- 
ly, the  difierence  with  which  the  Chi'istian  consciousness 
expresses  itself.  The  facts  on  which  it  rests  and  which  it 
realizes  are  everywhere  the  same.  Bat  if  the  way  of  ap- 
propriating the  effect  and  significancy  of  these  facts  is  dif- 
ferent with  different  persons,  so  that,  e.  g.,  one  sees  and 
finds  in  Christ  the  truth,  another  the  redemption,  a  third  all 
treasures  of  wisdom  and  knowledge,  still  another  justifica- 
tion, sanctification,  the  life,  the  teacher  ;  in  other  words,  if 
the  facts  find  with  individuals  altogether  different  points 
at  which  they  enter  into  the  innermost  personal  life,  then 
will  the  way  of  conve3ang  the  facts,  according  to  their 
contents,  connection,  order,  and  significancy,  to  the  under- 
standing, be  still  more  different.  In  this  relation  can  take 
place  not  merely  a  greater  or  less.     There  may  be  misap- 


138  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

prehensions  even,  unobservable  to  one,  plain  to  another, 
which  it  is  the  office  of  love  to  reconcile.  As  far  as  the 
fact  and  its  significancy  for  the  personal  life  remain  un- 
touched, so  far  must  there  be  allowed,  on  account  of  the 
limitedness  and  narrowness  of  our  knowledge,  a  doctrinal 
freedom  within  the  Christian  church  and  its  confession  re- 
garding divine  revelation.  And  this  doctrinal  freedom  can 
be  allowed  to  that  extent,  because  the  collective  life  of  the 
church  in  the  presence  of  its  God  and  of  its  salvation  will 
effect  a  continual  correction  of  such  errors.  Let  us,  by  way 
of  illustration,  suppose  that  the  fact  of  God's  becoming 
man  in  Christ,  or  perhaps  the  atonement,  has  been  appre- 
hended by  some  one  in  faith.  Now,  as  soon  as  the  question 
is  concerning  the  understanding,  there  arise,  it  may  be, 
doubts,  errors ;  incomprehensible  things  are  in  the  way. 
We  must  say,  on  the  one  hand,  that  such  doubts  are  of  a 
wholly  different  nature  where  the  question  is  concerning 
the  understanding  of  the  facts,  from  what  they  are  where 
it  is  concerning  the  facts  themselves,  and  we  must  guard 
against  a  mischievous  confounding  of  the  two.  On  the 
other  hand,  however,  we  must  in  this  case  claim  the  same 
privilege  which  is  so  readily,  in  a  far  higher  degree  than  we 
ask  it,  accorded  to  naturalists,  the  privilege  of  seeking  in 
different  ways  to  comprehend  one  and  the  same  fact. 

Above  all,  we  will  stand  by  this  :  where  divine  revelation 
is  concerned,  the  question  is  not  respecting  more  or  less 
comprehensible  propositions,  such  as  mathematical  or  phil- 
osophical formulas.  It  is  not  the  object  of  revelation  to 
furnish  us  such  propositions ;  it  proposes  neither  to  enrich 
our  knowledge,  nor,  as  is  sometimes  with  pleasure  said,  to 
augment  the  enrichment  of  our  knowledge.  The  question  is 
respecting  divine  and  human  pulsating  life,  respecting  a 
renewal  of  our  life  in  the  divine  mind  and  divine  strength. 


REASON,    CONSCIENCE,    AND    REVELATION  139 

It  is  true,  without  knowledge  conscious  life  is  impossible. 
Hence  there  is  no  religious  life  without  a  definite  religious 
confession,  and  in  this  sense,  certainly,  it  is  important  to 
draw  from  the  records  of  revelation,  the  Bible,  the  proposi- 
tions of  the  revealed  faith  and  life,  that  in  them  the  facts  of 
revelation  and  the  present  state  of  affairs,  i.  e.,  the  pres- 
ence of  salvation,  may  be  brought  to  expression.  Of  this 
work  the  Sacred  Scriptures,  as  the  "  register "  of  divine 
revelation  in  its  relations  to  our  inner  life  and  experience, 
must  be  made  the  basis,  without  their  being  so  used  as  that 
they  shall  in  any  way  encroach  upon  the  reason  or  trespass 
upon  the  rights  of  conscience. 

It  is  entirely  wrong  to  speak  of  an  opposition  between 
believing  and  knowing  in  the  sense  that  by  it  the  realm  of 
the  religious  life  in  general,  or  even  that  of  the  life  in  the 
God  of  present  grace, —  of  the  revealed  faith,  —  is  separated 
from  the  opposite.  All  faith  rests  upon  knowledge,  and 
when  it  is  not  produced  by  deduction  or  logical  demonstra- 
tion, it  must  ground  itself  upon  spiritual  perception  and 
contact.  Knowledge  and  faith  are  distinguished  from  each 
other  like  cognition  and  recognition ,  so,  faith  is  an  exer- 
cise of  obedience,  of  recognition,  and  hence  of  trust,  of  sur- 
render. Believing  and  knowing  are  also  distinguished 
from  each  other  like  cognizing  and  understanding,  and  in 
all  realms  of  life  believing  has  the  privilege  of  going  farther 
than  is  possible  to  the  understanding. 

Let  us  return  once  more  to  revelation.  What  we  find  in  it 
—  the  God  of  atonement,  —  He  is  not  merely  the  ideal  foun- 
tain of  life,  one  existing  only  in  thought,  but  since  he  is 
present,  he  is  actually  our  life's  new  origin,  and  in  his 
grace  and  truth  we  find  ourselves  bom  anew.  The  reason 
as  man's  sense  of  truth,  the  conscience  as  his  sense  of  right, 
are  alike  satisfied  by  the  life  and  righteousness  which  we 


140  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

here  find.  What  the  reason  seeks,  living,  personal  truth, 
a  bride  for  the  soul ;  what  the  conscience  requires,  righteous- 
ness, such  as  is  good  before  God ;  what  our  entire  being 
demands,  life,  eternally  flowing,  streaming,  blooming  life,  — 
all  is  offered  us  by  the  God  of  salvation,  of  grace,  of  atone- 
ment ;  and  hence  we  know  that  we  were  right  when  at  the 
beginning  we  said  that  reason,  conscience,  and  salvation 
formed  a  heavenly  —  better  a  divine-human  harmony.  All 
is  new  that  revelation  offers  us,  and  yet  it  is  to  us  nothing 
strange. 

We  might  conclude,  were  it  not  necessary,  for  the  sake 
of  completeness,  that  we  notice  yet  briefly  one  or  two  inci- 
dental questions.  There  is  one  which  concerns  the  accom- 
panying of  revelation  with  miracles.  It  is  really  not 
difficult  to  see  that  the  God,  whose  purpose  is  to  redeem 
the  human  race  from  sin  and  all  the  disturbances  and 
abnormiti^  brought  into  the  world  by  sin,  must  be  a  God 
of  miracles,  —  a  God  who  places  his  almighty  creative 
power  in  the  service  of  his  redeeming  love.  Not  the 
miracles  should  make  us  suspicious ;  rather  would  it  be 
strange  and  adapted  to  bring  the  fact  of  divine  revelation 
into  question,  if  it  were  not  accompanied  with  miracles. 
In  this,  however,  it  is  implied  that  the  miracles  are  not  to 
be  regarded  as  separate  thaumaturgic  feats  of  a  magician, 
with  the  motto  car  tel  est  mon  plaisir,  but  must  be  appre- 
hended in  connection  with  divine  revelation  and  their  ends. 
Then,  moreover,  it  is  apparent  that  they  cannot  be  expres- 
sions of  a  self-correcting  power,  i.  e.,  of  a  power  which 
annuls  the  laws  of  nature,  but  are,  at  most,  corrections  of 
a  mistake  where  in  individual  cases  they  seem  to  harm  a 
natural  law,  extraordinary,  but  not  unreasonable  manifes- 
tations of  power,  wherever  they  occur  manifestly  outside 


REASON,    CONSCIENCE,    AND    REVELATION  141 

of  the  natural  connection  of  cause  and  effect.^  Reasonable 
as  to  order,  purpose,  and  end  ;  reasonable  notwithstanding 
all  their  deviations  from  nature ;  reasonable,  i.  e.,  not  as 
disturbance  or  destruction  of  the  otherwise  uninterrupted 
course  of  nature,  in  the  end  all  the  miracles,  even  the  most 
decried  of  them,  can  in  connection  with  divine  revelation 
be  explained,  although  not  naturally.  Only  there  is 
needed,  assuredly,  neither  an  acquaintance  with  natural 
science,  nor  a  contemning  of  all  physical  investigation ; 
but  there  is  needed  a  knowledge  of  the  God  who  reveals 
himself  as  the  God  of  salvation,  of  redemption,  and  so 
of  miracles.  It  sounds  lofty,  but  is,  mildly  expressed,  a 
boundless  immodesty,  which  in  a  reverse  of  positions 
would  never  be  forgiven  us,  when  Justus  von  Liebig  so 
grandiosely  says  that,  by  the  explanation  of  the  force  — 
which,  between  ourselves,  natural  science  has  not  to  this 
day  yet  discovered  —  of  the  planetary  s^^stem  and  of  fire, 
the  earlier  conceptions  of  God,  heaven,  and  hell  have  lost 
their  meaning.  Let  us,  however,  have  the  courage  to  set 
up  for  our  Christian  believing,  thinking,  and  teaching,  just 
as  is  done  by  the  natural  sciences,  the  claim  of  exact  inves- 
tigation,  of   close   observation,   and    to   cause  it    to    be 

1  Comp.  my  lecture  "  Ueber  die  "Wunder  im  Zusammenhang  der  gottlichen 
Offenbarung"  (Barmen,  1865),  Dr.  R.  Rothe,  Zur  Dogmatik  (Gotha,  1863).  p.  108. 
'•  Where  does  a  miracle  come  into  conflict  with  the  laws  of  nature  ?  "We  answer 
confidently,  Nowhere  I  However,  it  does  sharply  oppose  the  presumed  absolutism 
of  natural  law,  and  the  idolatry  which  atheism  would  like  to  practise  therewith. 
It  attests  that  natural  law  is  by  no  means  the  highest  power  in  the  world,  but  that 
above  it  rules  He  who  made  it,  the  living,  personal  God,  —  that  in  it  the  Creator 
made  not  a  barrier  to  himself,  by  which  his  absolute  and  absolutely  sacred  free- 
dom is  limited,  but  a  serviceable  means,  which  never  refuses  itself  to  his  pur- 
poses. When  God  works  miracles,  he  would  say  thereby,  that  here  is  One  who 
can  do  what  created  nature,  what  creation  entire  cannot  do ;  he  works  in  a  miracle 
Bometldng  outside  of  and  above  the  process  and  the  laws  of  nature."  Comp.  p. 
100  f. 


142  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

accepted,  that  the  spirit  within  us,  reason  and  conscience, 
are  better  observers  than  are  the  microscope  and  retort. 

And  now,  finally,  —  as  to  the  way  in  which  the  revela- 
tions of  God  were  received,  —  let  us  not  forget  that  their 
content  extends  beyond  the  bounds  of  the  every-day  and 
natural  thinking  and  knowing  as  far  as  God  does  himself. 
Hence,  it  cannot  be  considered  absurd  and  unreasonable 
if,  wherever  a  man  is  chosen  to  be  a  receiver  and  bearer  of 
these  revelations,  the  barriers  of  the  every-day,  of  the 
natural  knowing,  fall,  and  the  man's  inner  sense  must  bo 
opened  before  he  can  receive  the  impartations  of  God,  as 
was  the  case  with  the  seers  and  prophets,  until  all  that 
God  has  to  impart  —  the  Word  —  has  descended  entirely 
out  of  its  supernatural  sphere  into  the  domain  of  humanity, 
until  the  Word  was  made  flesh,  and  is  present  in  the 
Christian  assembly  (Tit.  1 :  3),  whereby  the  manner  of 
New  Testament  knowing  dijafers  from  that  of  Old  Testa- 
ment knowing. 

Thus  much  must  here  suflSce.  The  revelation  of  God 
forms  a  great  system,  complete  in  itself,  embracing  heaven 
and  earth,  time  and  eternity,  God  and  man,  in  which  all  is 
reasonable,  if  the  premise  is  correct,  —  God,  sin.  And 
these  the  conscience  attests  to  every  one.  The  contest 
against  the  truth  and  contents  of  divine  revelation,  in  the 
name  of  reason  and  conscience,  is  only  the  second  stage  of 
a  contest  we  all  have  to  engage  in  to  a  greater  or  less  ex- 
tent with  ourselves, —  a  contest  in  which  the  enemy  can  take 
three  positions :  I  like  not ;  I  can  not ;  I  will  not.  The 
real  spiritual  struggle  will  commence  only  when  the  enemy 
has  taken  the  third  position. 


LECTURE   IV 
MIRACLES 

By  REV.  M.  FUCHS 

PASTOR  AT  OPPIN,   NEAR  HALLE 


REV.  MARTIN   FUCHS 


BIOGEAPHIOAL 


Rev.  Martin  Fuchs  was  pastor  at  Oppin,  near  Halle,  when  he 
delivered  his  lecture  in  Bremen.  He  is  now  located  at  Cologne. 
He  was  born  at  Pollham,  August  27,  1843.  His  lecture  on  Mira- 
cles, as  presented  in  this  book,  shows  him  to  be  a  very  wide- 
reaching,  clear,  and  logical  thinker.  This  lecture  has  been  pro- 
nounced one  of  the  very  best  in  the  volume.  In  Mr.  Fuch's 
conception  miracles  are  not  events  that  take  place  in  contradic- 
tion of  nature,  or  as  violations  of  natural  law  ;  but  they  connect 
themselves  with  the  ordinary  course  of  natural  events,  as  the 
incoming  of  a  supernatural  force,  or  of  some  power  above 
nature,  into  the  workings  of  nature  itself.  They  may  therefore 
be  regarded  as  ''the  high  and  shining  points  of  the  course  of 
nature. ' '  Their  possibility  depends  altogether  on  the  conception 
that  is  taken  of  God  in  relation  to  the  world. 


SUMMAEY  OF  LEOTUEE  lY 


With  miracles  Christianity  can  be  said,  without  exaggeration, 
to  stand  and  fall— Kevelation  as  associated  with  miracles  ;  every 
revelation  a  miracle,  and  every  miracle  a  revelation — A  miracle 
defined  as  the  entrance  of  the  supernatural  into  the  connection 
of  the  natural — ^Two  premises  upon  which  the  conception  of  a 
miracle  rests  :  first,  the  real  existence  of  the  supernatural,  or  of 
a  free,  personal  God,  and  of  the  spiritual  world ;  and  second,  a 
living  relation  existing  between  the  unseen  spiritual  world  and 
our  visible  world— Miracles  must  be,  therefore,  wholly  natural 
occurrences,  grounded  in  the  organization  of  the  world  and  re- 
quired by  it — The  miracle-conception  is  a  heart-and-center 
point  of  biblical  truth,  yet  one  that  in  these  times  is  very  ear- 
nestly combatted— To  affirm  the  impossibility  of  miracles  natural 
science  must  deny  either  the  real  existence  of  the  supernatural 
or  the  fact  of  a  living  relation  existing  between  the  natural  and 
supernatural  worlds ;  the  last  is  deism,  and  the  first  is  panthe- 
ism— Pantheistic  view  of  God  and  of  his  relation  to  the  world 
— Deistic  view  of  God  and  of  his  relation  to  the  world — 
The  true  or  Christian  view  is  a  combination  of  the  deistic  and 
the  pantheistic — Not  necessary  to  affirm  that  a  miracle  contra- 
dicts the  order  of  nature  ;  the  highest  or  common  law  in  which 
all  individual  laws  are  included,  is  the  will  of  God— The  world's 
course  not  merely  endures  miracles,  it  requires  them — Miracles 
are  also  actual,  the  whole  history  of  salvation  is  a  history  of 
miracle— Miracles  are  not  the  chief  thing  in  importance,  but 
only  signs  following  in  the  train  of  revelation  ;  they  direct  at- 
tention from  the  outward  to  the  inward,  and  also  toward  the 
future,  to  the  great  supernatural  events  which  will  occur  in  con- 
nection with  Christ's  second  appearance. 


IV 


MIBACLES 

PASTOR     AT     OPPIN,      NEAR     HALLE 

^^Jta^HE  subject  which  is  to  occupy  us  at  this  hour, 
fum  \)  ^^^^^  "^  ^^^  ^"^^  compass,  is  of  such  deep-reaching 
V^^J^  and  determinative  import  for  all  Christian  thinking, 
believing,  and  living,  that  with  it  Christianity  can 
be  said,  without  exaggeration,  to  stand  and  fall.  The  ques- 
tion of  miracles,  w^hich  the  present  lecture  mast  try  to  an- 
swer, is  as  fundamental  and  cardinal  a  question  of  the 
Christian  view  of  the  world  as  is  that  of  revelation,  and  the 
two  are  most  intimately  connected  ;  faith  in  revelation  and 
faith  in  miracles  being  inseparable  things,  each  of  which 
requires  and  conditions  the  other.  Not  onl}^  h  revelation 
historically  associated  with  miracles,  so  that  every  mani- 
festation of  God  to  the  world  is,  as  it  were,  irradiated  with 
miracles,  as  the  sun  is  with  beams,  but  at  the  basis  of  this 
historical  connection,  of  which  the  entire  Scripture  gives  us 
evidence,  there  is  also  an  inner  connection  of  essence. 
Every  revelation  is,  in  the  wider  sense,  a  miracle,  a  super- 
natural event,  something  which  has  entered  into  the  world 
from  without,  not  something  produced  by  the  world  itself; 
and  every  miracle,  in  the  narrower  sense,  is  a  revelation,  an 
immediate  self-announcement  of  the  living  God.     The  two 

conceptions  resolve  into  each  other,  and  their  distinction  is 

147 


148  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

only,  that  one  represents  more  the  content,  the  other  more 
the  form  of  the  divine  facts.  Every  revelation  of  God 
takes  place  in  the  form  of  a  miracle ;  every  miracle,  how- 
ever, has  for  its  content  a  divine  revelation. 

But  in  what  form,  then,  must  a  fact  occur,  to  be  qualified 
to  claim  the  name  of  mirack?  or,  in  simpler  expression,  i 
what  do  we  call  a  miracle?  To  the  current  definition,  —  a 
miracle  is  an  event  which  cannot  be  explained  from  the 
known  laws  of  nature,  —  we  shall  be  unable  to  hold.  For, 
first,  this  explanation  draws  no  firm  boundary  line  between 
what  is  miraculous  and  what  is  natural,  but  the  division  of 
the  two  realms  is  made  dependent  on  the  subjective 
apprehension  of  the  laws  of  nature,  so  that  the  possibility 
is  not  excluded  of  seeing,  in  the  end,  with  the  progress  of 
natural  philosophy,  all  the  miraculous  resolved  into  the 
natural.  Then,  secondly,  this  definition  is  of  a  purely 
negative  sort,  since  it  tells  us  only  what  a  miracle  is  not ; 
but  on  what  is  the  specific  nature  of  a  miracle,  it  gives  us 
no  information.  Hence  we  say,  better  and  more  correctly, 
a  miracle  is  the  entrance  of  the  supernatural  into  the 
connection  of  the  natural,  the  intervention  of  a  higher  order 
of  things  into  the  lower,  the  immediate  interposition  of  a 
God  above  the  world  in  the  course  of  the  world  and 
nature. 

Let  us  also,  to  clear  up  the  matter  fully,  state  just  here 
the  premises  upon  which  the  conception  of  a  miracle  rests, 
the  foundation  upon  which  it  builds  itself.  If  a  miracle  is 
the  entrance  of  the  supernatural  into  the  natural,  then 
with  this  is  premised  on  the  one  hand  the  real  existence  of 
the  supernatural,  —  the  real  existence  of  a  God  above  the 
world,  and  of  a  world  of  higher  powers,  laws,  and  orders 
than  are  those  of  the  visible  universe.  On  the  other  hand. 
It  is  premised  that  that  invisible  and  this  visible  reality, 


MIRACLES  149 

that  superior  and  this  inferior  universe,  stand  to  each  other 
in  a  living  relation ;  that  they  do  not,  without  connection 
and  contact,  continue  their  existence  near  each  other,  like 
two  parallel  lines  which  never  meet,  but  that  they  are  for 
each  other  ;  that  a  living  way  extends  from  the  upper  world 
to  the  lower,  and  from  the  lower  world  to  the  upper,  on 
which  they  come  constantly  into  contact.  Just  this  is  the 
peculiar  view  of  the  world  taught  by  Christianity  and  the 
Bible :  that  above  what  is  visible  is  that  which  is  invisible ; 
above  the  earth  a  heaven  ;  above  the  created  mundane  and 
human  existence  an  uncreated  divine  existence ;  nay,  that 
to  this  latter,  as  the  original  entity,  belongs  a  much  higher 
degree  of  reality  than  is  had  by  the  former  ("  for  the 
things  which  are  seen  are  temporal ;  but  the  things  which 
are  not  seen  are  eternal ")  ;  but  that,  notwithstanding  this 
distinction,  there  yawns  between  the  two  no  impassable 
chasm,  making  transit  from  either  to  the  other  impossible  ; 
that  rather,  as  surely  as  the  visible  universe  has  the  ground 
of  its  being  in  the  invisible,  there  is  a  living  connection 
between  the  two,  by  virtue  of  which  the  higher  powers 
interpose  continually  in  the  earthly  course  of  things,  now 
quietl}^,  now  in  so  raised  and  energetic  a  concentration 
that  it  becomes  a  personal  entrance  of  divinity  into 
humanity.  On  the  basis  of  such  a  view  of  the  world,  —  this 
is  self-evident, —  miracles  must  be  altogether  natural  occur- 
rences, occurrences  grounded  in  the  entu-e  organization  of 
the  world,  and  required  by  it. 

You  see,  already,  the  mh-acle-conception  is  a  heart-and- 
centre-point  of  Biblical  truth,  which  frivolously  to  abandon, 
or  to  regard  as  an  incidental,  non-essential  matter,  would 
be  a  capital  error,  a  negation  in  its  consequences  funda- 
mentally ruinous,  a  surrendering  of  Biblical  Christianity. 
For  with  its  fall,  fall   not  merely  the  individual  miracle- 


150  THE    BREMEN   LECTURES 

narratives  of  the  Old  and  New  Testament,  which  many 
will  doubtless  in  this  connection  think  of  first,  but  there 
falls  the  entire  history  of  salvation,  which  is  a  continued 
history  of  miracles  ;  there  falls  the  miracle  of  all  miracles, 
the  person  of  Jesus  Christ,  with  his  supernatural  entrance 
into  the  world  and  his  supernatural  departure  from  the 
world  ;  there  falls  his  heavenly  origin,  his  sinless  birth,  his 
resurrection  and  ascension ;  there  fall,  in  a  word,  all  the 
fundamental  facts  and  principles  of  our  salvation  in  one 
common  ruin,  and  there  remains  for  us  the  annihilating 
word,  "  Your  faith  is  vain  ! " 

But,  important  as  is  the  point  which  the  adherents  of 
Scripture  truth  have  to  affirm  and  maintain  in  the  miracle- 
conception,  it  is  one  to  just  as  great  a  degree  combated. 
Against  no  other  point  of  faith  has  there  risen  so  loud  and 
sharp  an  opposition  as  has  come  into  existence  against  this. 
Nay,  so  boisterous  and  confident  of  victory  is  the  assault 
which  the  later  science  and  the  so-called  "  modern  con- 
sciousness "  have  undertaken  upon  this  —  as  it  is  thought 
—  most  exposed  post,  that  already  the  banner  of  triumph, 
with  the  inscription,  "  Miracles  are  impossible,"  seems  to 
be  planted  on  the  battlements  of  the  old  castle,  and  the  castle 
itself  appears  to  be  forever  fallen.  Indeed,  if  it  were 
possible  to  kill  a  truth  by  the  most  multitudinous  vocifera- 
tions against  it,  it  would  be  all  over  with  the  matter  of  mir- 
acles ;  —  if  it  were  possible  to  give  an  assumption  from 
which  one  arbitrarily  starts,  by  the  boldest  possible  asser- 
tions, the  stamp  of  a  proved  conclusion,  this  matter  would  now 
be  in  the  grave.  Even  Schleiermacher's  heart  sank  within 
him,  as  he  saw  the  onset  which  the  newer  times  were  mak- 
ing, with  all  the  means  of  science,  upon  this  tenet  of  the 
Biblical  faith,  and  he  writes  to  Liicke  (in  the  Theol.  Stud, 
und  Krit.)  :  "  I  anticipate  that  we  shall  have  to  learn  to  do 


MIRACLES  151 

without  much  of  that  which  many  are  yet  accustomed  to 
think  is  inseparably  connected  with  the  essence  of  Chris- 
tianity. .  .  .  Our  New  Testament  miracles,  .  .  . 
however  long  it  may  be  postponed,  will  fall  anew,  but 
from  worthier  and  far  better  established  postulates  than 
formerly,  in  the  times  of  the  windy  Encyclopedia.  What 
is  then  to  be  done?  .  .  .  What  do  you  propose 
doing,  dear  friend  ?  Will  you  after  all  entrench  yourself 
behind  the  outworks,  and  let  yourself  be  blockaded  by 
science?  The  bombardment  of  ridicule  will  not  harm  you 
much,  but  the  blockade!  —  the  severance  of  yourself  from 
all  science,  which  will  then,  just  because  you  so  entrench 
yourself,  be  compelled  by  you  to  hoist  the  flag  of  unbelief." 
But  should  the  situation  be  really  so  gloomy,  so  full  of 
peril,  so  desperate  for  faith?  Ought  it  not  to  have  weapons 
of  offence  and  of  defence,  which  no  science  can  shatter? 
Let  us  see. 

To  affirm  the  impossibilty  of  miracles,  modern  science 
must  naturally  seek  to  destroy  the  foundation  upon  which  the 
Christian  belief  in  miracles  rests,  —  the  Biblical  view  of  the 
world  which  we  have  indicated  above.  Now,  such  attempt,  in 
correspondence  with  the  two  moments  which  this  view  of  the 
world  emphasizes,  can  be  made  in  a  twofold  way,  either  by 
denying  the  one  or  by  opposing  the  other.  Either  the  real 
existence  of  the  supernatural  is  denied,  while  on  the  one 
hand  it  is  referred  directl}^  to  the  realm  of  dreams  and  rev- 
eries, and  on  the  other  —  which,  however,  in  the  end 
amounts  to  the  same  thing  —  it  is  identified  with  the  real 
essence  of  the  visible  world ;  or  the  living  connection  of 
God  and  the  world  is  denied,  and  the  two  are  conceived  of 
as  separated  from  each  other.  The  former  is  the  pantheis- 
tic and  —  in  its  consistent  result  —  materialistic  view  of  the 
world  ;  the  latter  is  the  deistic  view.     Both  are  sworn  ene- 


152  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

mies  of  miracles,  and  the  claims  of  both  we  shall  there- 
fore have  to  examine  briefly. 

Pantheism  denies  the  existence  of  a  personal  God  above 
the  world,  —  of  God  as  the  Creator  and  Ruler  of  the  world. 
It  makes  God  one  with  the  world.  It  says,  God  is  the 
"  Universal "  lying  at  the  basis  of  all  the  manifoldness  of 
the  world  and  of  its  individual  phenomena,  the  universal 
essence  which  is  in  all ;  he  exists  not  independently  for 
himself  as  self-conscious  being,  he  is  only  in  the  world  as 
its  inner  ground  of  life,  from  which  everything  proceeds, 
and  to  which  everything  returns,  but  not  outside  of  and 
above  the  world  as  its  Lord  and  Creator.  Thus  God  re- 
mains but  an  empty,  unsubstantial  name,  and  it  is  only  the 
legitimate  consequence  of  this  process  of  negation,  when 
at  last  the  name  is  laid  aside,  and  the  existence  of  God  is 
absolutely  denied.  Pantheism  ends  in  that  crude  and  un- 
adorned species  of  materialism  in  which  modern  natural 
science  sees  its  glorj^  and  its  crown ;  let  us  rather  say, 
most  representatives  of  this  science,  for  there  are  still 
noble  spirits  among  them,  spiritual  relatives  of  a  Kepler, 
a  Copernicus,  and  a  Newton,  who  were  not  only  heroes  of 
science,  but  also  heroes  of  faith,  and  of  whom  the  sainted 
Dr.  Mallet,  with  joy  of  heart,  said,  "  It  is  delightful  to  see 
how  such  heroes  of  science  bow  in  the  lowliest  reverence 
before  revelation,  while  the  light  troops  file  by  without  so 
much  as  removing  their  hats."  Yes,  the  light  troops,  the 
light  spirits,  —  they  have  surfeited  themselves  on  their 
natural  science,  they  have  become  drunken  from  the  over- 
flowing measure  of  their  knowledges  and  discoveries,  and  to 
the  delirium  with  which  they  are  aflected  the  great  realities 
of  a  personal  God  and  of  a  supersensuous  spirit  form  no 
Jiflficulty.  Science  decrees,  away  with  them !  and  before 
this  decisive  sentence  they  must  fall,  just  because  they  are 


MIRACLES  153 

miracles,  i.  e.,  facts  which  cannot  be  comprehended  in  the 
way  of  mere  natural  philosophy.  For  this  is  passing,  for 
once,  as  an  incontrovertible  maxim :  natural  science  is  not 
merely  the  greatest  among  the  sciences,  but  the  only  true 
science,  in  comparison  with  which  all  metaphysics  and 
theology  are  but  dreams ;  the  only  possible  method  of  ap- 
prehension  is  by  the  sense-perception,  and  all  that  cannot 
be  apprehended  by  the  use  of  the  microscope,  balance, 
and  retort,  does  not  exist.  Strange  conclusion!  It  ia 
first  assumed,  "  there  can  be  only  the  sensuous ; "  then  the 
inference  is  boldly  drawn,  "  consequently  there  is  nothing 
supersensuous."  What  is  proclaimed  as  the  result  of  in- 
vestigation is  the  arbitrary  assumption  from  which  they 
start.  It  is  only  an  hypothesis,  on  which  the  entire  struc- 
ture rests. 

But  how,  then,  does  pantheism  explain  the  riddle  of  the 
world,  if  it  expunges  the  supernatural,  if  it  blots  out  the 
existence  of  a  supermundane  God,  the  Creator?  It  does 
not  explain  it  at  all ;  it  simply  interdicts  the  question  of 
the  whence  and  the  wherefore  of  all  things,  —  this  irre- 
pressible question  which,  nevertheless,  rises  in  every  human 
mind  and  heart,  and  has  risen  ever  since  men  began  to 
think  and  feel ;  it  interdicts  it,  and  says,  "  The  world  is 
because  it  is,  and  as  it  is,  —  and  that  is  enough.  The  only 
reality  is  material  being,  matter  and  the  forces  connected 
with  it ;  the  only  eternal  and  absolute  entity  is  the  atoms, 
the  indivisible  particles  of  matter  which  combine  with  each 
other,  at  one  time  so,  at  another  differently,  according  to 
the  laws  of  gravity,  cohesion,  and  chemical  affinity ; 
change  in  matter,  this  is  the  secret  of  all  animation  and  of 
all  development.  From  this  alternate  play  of  the  atoms 
and  their  forces  has  proceeded  all  that  is,  not  merely  the 
inorganic  world,  but  the  organic  also,  up  to  man ;  even  the 


154  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

thinking  human  spirit  is  only  a  product  of  materiality." 
Then,  certainly,  a  full  end  is  put  to  miracles.  If  there  is 
nothing  but  the  regular  course  of  the  play  of  atoms,  which 
goes  on  in  eternal  repetition  ;  if  there  is  only  nature  and 
no  spirit,  only  the  world  and  no  God,  then,  assuredly,  but 
not  till  then,  all  miracles  are  eliminated  and  banished.  On 
this  stand-point  all  footing  for  the  conception  of  a  miracle 
is  wanting ;  for,  if  there  is  only  a  change  in  matter,  which 
takes  place  only  according  to  the  laws  inherent  in  matter, 
how  can  anything  take  place  which  is  outside  of  and  above 
these  laws  ?  From  this  point  of  view,  Biichner,  one  of  the 
leaders  of  the  light  troops,  remarks,  "  How  would  it  be 
possible,  that  the  invariable  order  in  which  things  move 
should  ever  be  disturbed,  and  an  irreparable  rent  not  be 
made  thereby  through  the  world  ?  Of  necessity  the  world 
would  forsake  its  poles  and  go  to  ruin.  And  how  would  it 
be  possible,"  he  continues,  "  that  the  invariable  order 
should  ever  be  disturbed,  and  every  science  not  be  made 
to  appear  as  childish  trash  ? "  And  so  a  God  who  works 
miracles  there  may  not  be,  otherwise  human  science  would 
lose  its  reputation ;  for,  if  it  cannot  force  all  events  within 
its  laws  and  rules,  it  would  be  only  childish  trash.  Is  this 
the  humility  of  genuine  science,  or  is  it  the  swollen  vanity 
and  the  drunken  arrogance  of  autocratic  caprice  which  here 
speaks?     "  It  is  not,  for  it  must  not  be  !  " 

Now,  how  does  this  materialistic  view  of  the  world  bear 
examination,  I  will  not  say  before  the  Bible  and  Christian- 
ity, but  only  before  the  thinking  reason  ?  before  the  light 
which  even  from  nature  shines  in  every  man  ?  We  are 
obliged  to  say,  it  is  the  contradiction  of  all  reason,  the  most 
irrational  and  absurd  thing  imaginable.  Materialism,  this 
destroyer  of  the  spirit,  is  in  its  logical  result  the  destruc- 
tion and  the  end  of  all  thinking ;  for  it  sets  itself  in  antag- 


MIRACLES  155 

onism  with  the  necessities  of  thought,  with  the  fundamental 
forms  and  laws  of  all  human  thinking,  which  are  implanted 
in  the  nature  of  our  intelligence,  and  from  which  we  cannot 
depart  without  becoming  irrational.  One  such  necessary 
thought  is  the  conception  of  a  "  First  Cause."  The  human 
thinking  must  search  after  the  ground  of  phenomena,  after 
the  whence  and  the  whj^,  and  indeed  it  cannot  stand  still 
and  content  itself  until  it  has  come  to  an  ultimate  gi'ound, 
to  an  absolute  causality ;  for  all  intermediate  causes  are,  in 
fact,  not  causes,  but  means ;  only  the  first  cause  is  in  the 
proper  sense  of  the  word  a  cause.  Were  there  not  such 
a  one,  then  we  should  have  only  means,  mere  effects  without 
a  cause,  —  and  that  is  inconceivable,  that  is  to  the  human 
reason  a  wholly  impossible  thought ;  it  must  press  forward 
to  the  ultimate  cause ;  it  cannot  do  otherwise.  Now,  if 
materialism  says,  "Matter  is  eternal;  the  atoms,  of  which 
all  consists  and  is  composed,  these  are  the  ground  of  all 
being,"  then  the  question  necessarily  arises,  whence  comes 
this  relation  and  aflSnity  of  the  atoms  to  each  other  ?  whence 
comes  it  that  they  remained  not  in  their  isolation,  but  have 
entered  into  combinations  from  which  a  whole  world  of  har- 
mony has  resulted  ?  If  all  has  proceeded  from  the  motion 
of  the  atoms,  where  is  the  moving  power  which  has  set  the 
atoms  in  motion?  In  short,  the  conception  of  the  atom  is 
not  that  of  a  cause  with  which  thought  could  rest  content, 
but  it  points  one  back  to  a  higher  ground.  Only  the  con- 
ception of  God,  of  an  eternal,  supermundane  Creator  is  in 
truth  an  ultimate  cause,  which  satisfies  the  requirement  of 
thought.  Biichner  says,  "  The  hinge-point  of  the  contro- 
versy between  materialism  and  belief  in  a  God  is  the  ques- 
tion whether  reason  is  before  nature,  or  is  in  it."  But  Zoll* 
mann  rightly  answers  him  ("Bibel  und  Naturwissen- 
schaft")  :    "Reason   can  be  in   nature  only  on   condition 


.156  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

that  it  is  before  nature.  For  if  the  existence  of  reason  in 
nature  is  to  be  adhered  to,  then  it  follows  that  it  must  be  in 
the  individual  atoms  whose  combination  forms  the  totality 
of  phenomena.  The  atoms  thus  would  have  to  be  them- 
selves rational ;  every  one  would  have  to  be  endowed  with 
the  peculiar  properties  by  which  the  great  manifoldness  of 
the  combinations  is  made  possible,  —  a  reason  which  far  sur- 
passes that  of  man ;  for  man  can  only  with  the  greatest 
difficulty  afterwards  search  out  and  construe  that  which  the 
atoms  have  achieved.  Either,  therefore,  the  materialistic 
assertion  that  reason  is  in  nature,  has  this  meaning,  and  then 
man  would  have  in  every  particle  of  matter  in  his  body  an 
infinitely  higher  reason  than  he  himself  possesses  (which  is 
nonsense)  ;  or  it  has  no  meaning  at  all,  and  it  only  re- 
mains for  us  to  say,  reason  is  before  nature,  and  only 
because  nature  has  been  constituted  by  it  is  it  in  nature ; 
for  that  cause  only  can  anything  of  a  rational  character 
occur  in  it."  Certainly,  science  cannot  possibly  conceive 
of  matter  as  eternal,  as  having  the  ground  of  its  being  in 
itself;  it  sees  itself  rather  forced  by  the  necessity  of 
thought  to  the  recognition  of  the  Biblical  truth :  matter  is 
created ;  there  is  above  matter  and  before  matter  a  spiritual 
principle,  an  absolute  and  supreme  reason,  an  eternal  God, 
—  the  Creator. 

Another  thought-form  and  thought-necessity  of  our 
intelligence  is  the  idea  of  design,  the  question  as  to  the 
wherefore ;  and  everywhere  where  an  event  bearing  the 
marks  of  design  and  plan  meets  us,  where  an  orderly 
development  of  a  higher  from  a  lower  to  a  definite  end 
takes  place,  there  our  thinking  is  satisfied,  there  it  recog- 
nizes itself,  a  thinking  and  willing  being,  that  pursues 
ends  of  which  it  is  conscious.  There  it  cannot  help  thinking 
before  and  above  the   event  to  the  supersensuous   spirit. 


MIRACLES  157 

Here  also  materialism  must  first  destroy  the  rational 
intelligence,  to  deny  the  being  of  God.  Events  bearing 
the  traces  of  design,  developments  of  the  higher  from  the 
lower,  plan  and  order,  meet  man  in  universal  nature.  How 
does  materialism  explain  this?  By  attributing  all  to 
chance,  to  the  unconscious  play  of  the  atoms !  Zollmann 
appositely  says  (ibid.)  :  "  It  is  the  most  colossal  chance- 
hypothesis  imaginable ;  by  chance  ethereal  atoms  come 
together,  and  light  is  produced ;  by  chance  ponderable 
atoms  combine  and  form  acids  and  salts ;  by  chance  they 
form  stones,  plants,  animals,  men,  fixed  stars,  —  all  things 
possible.  Chance  is  the  great  necromancer  who  stands  on 
the  platform,  and,  with  magic  skill,  summons  up  whatever 
the  respected  public  wishes  !  To  believe  such  an  hypothe- 
sis surpasses  the  credulity  of  all  believers  together."  We 
add,  to  require  this  belief  of  us,  is  to  require  an  abandon- 
ment of  all  thinking. 

I  will  not  longer  weary  you  with  these  expositions  of 
the  absurdity  of  materialism ;  besides,  this  absurdity  is 
very  easily  to  be  discerned.  I  only  ask,  where  is  the 
charcoal-faith,  —  as  the  materialists  are  fond  of  terming  in 
contempt  the  Christianity  which  believes  the  Bible,  — 
where  is  it?  There,  where  in  the  great,  wonderful  cosmos, 
in  this  stupendous  structure  of  harmony  and  order,  is  seen 
the  work  of  an  Eternal  Spirit,  of  a  living  God ;  or  there, 
where  blindly  and  without  sense  and  understanding  the 
god  "Chance"  is  elevated  to  the  throne?  Where  is 
reason?  There,  where  it  is  believed  and  said,  "From 
God  and  to  God  are  all  things  ; "  or  there,  where  all  ques- 
tioning as  to  the  ground  and  end  of  things  is  excluded, 
where  empirical  reality  is  adhered  to,  in  a  stubborn  do-not- 
know  and  do-not-care-to-know  disposition,  and  where  the 


158  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

quintessence  of  all  wisdom  is  seen  in  the  tenet,  "It  is  as 
it  is  "  ?  Where  is  truth  ?  There,  where  the  spirit,  following 
its  inmost  tendency  to  truth,  mounts  up  to  the  Father  of 
spirits  and  bows  in  worship  before  him ;  or  there,  where, 
in  order  to  avoid  rendering  to  the  Eternal  Spirit  the  honor 
due  him,  the  existence  of  the  human  spirit  is  denied  and 
its  nature  degi'aded  to  the  image  of  mere  dust,  with  the 
destiny  of  becoming  putrefaction?  These  questions  need 
only  be  asked ;  they  answer  themselves  in  every  human 
heart  and  conscience.  Theoretical  materialism  is  a  web  of 
the  brain,  the  magical  influence  of  which  upon  the  present 
generation  has  its  only  ground  in  the  fact  that  it  furnishes 
welcome  support  and  gives  the  appearance  of  justification 
to  practical  materialism,  to  the  sense  entangled  in  the 
earthly.  Scientifically,  after  a  short  cr3dng  of  victory,  it 
has  made  speedy  bania-uptcy. 

We  turn  now  to  the  other  view  of  the  world,  which 
likewise  reserves  no  room  for  miracles,  likewise  proclaims 
their  impossibility,  without,  however,  in  common  with 
materialism,  flatly  denying  the  existence  of  the  super- 
natural. It  is  deism,  so  called.  This  view,  it  is  true, 
retains  the  existence  of  a  God  above  the  world,  and  is 
willing  to  honor  him  as  the  world's  Creator ;  but,  while  it 
does  that,  it  errs  as  to  the  other  moment  of  truth  belonging 
to  the  Biblical  view,  namely,  the  living  intercourse  between 
God  and  the  world,  by  virtue  of  wliich  a  continual  interpo- 
sition of  God  in  the  world's  course  is  allowed.  Deism 
separates  God  and  the  world ;  it  makes  a  stiff",  mechanical 
division  between  the  two.  It  knows  only  a  God  outside 
of  the  world,  not  a  God  dwelling  in  and  working  everywhere 
through  the  world.  It  decrees,  at  any  rate,  a  first  miracle, 
the  creation  of  the  world ;  but  with  this  first  and   only 


MIRACLES  159 

miracle  it  closes  the  series  for  all  time.  Since  the  crea- 
tion, it  says,  the  natural  forces  and  laws  which  God 
established  have  been  the  efficient  and  determining  cause  of 
the  course  of  the  world.  God  himself,  however,  has,  as 
it  were,  retired  to  a  position  of  rest,  and  only  looks  on,  to 
see  how  the  world,  called  into  being  by  him  and  ruled 
according  to  unalterable  laws,  moves  on.  How  could  he 
interfere  and  help?  That  would  be,  indeed,  to  presuppose 
that  he  has  produced  something  imperfect,  something  which 
after  a  time  needed  the  hand  of  improvement.  Is  this 
conceivable?  The  perfect  God  has  created  a  perfect 
world,  and  every  interposition  would  be  a  disturbance  and 
destruction  of  the  whole  ! 

Here,  also,  we  see  the  inviolability  and  the  inflexibility 
of  the  laws  of  nature  are,  in  the  strongest  manner,  ac- 
cented. Natural  law  is  made  to  be  even  for  the  Creator  an 
impassable  barrier.  The  world  is  regarded  as  a  piece  of 
clock-work  which,  once  wound  up  and  set  a-going,  keeps 
running  of  itself  and  allows  no  disturbance,  as  a  machine 
which,  once  constructed  and  provided  with  steam-power, 
can  be  left  to  itself,  and  it  works  on  in  the  regular  way. 
God  and  the  world  stand  to  each  other  in  only  an  external 
relation  ;  they  have  no  living  communication  each  with  the 
other ;  there  is,  indeed,  a  Creator,  but  no  Ruler,  much  less 
a  Finisher  of  the  world. 

But  what  a  mechanical,  we  might  almost  say,  what  a 
childish  notion  this  is  of  God  and  the  world,  and  of  the 
relation  between  them !     "What  is  a  God,"  says  Goethe,  — 

"  Who  on  the  outside  forces 
The  all,  as  it  about  his  finger  courses  ? 
He  should  act  in  the  world,  its  interests  sharing, 
For  it  in  self,  for  self  in  it  thus  caring; 


160  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

That  all  which  in  him  lives  and  moves  and  is, 
Shall  ne*er  his  power,  ne'er  his  spirit  miss ! "  ^ 

And  what  is  a  God,  who,  having  departed  from  the  world, 
persists  in  pure  passivity,  and  in  the  great  drama  of  the 
world  plays  only  the  idle  spectator?  Surely,  a  God  who 
is  dead  and  satisfies  neither  the  wants  of  our  minds  nor  of 
our  hearts,  a  God  who  is  far  off  in  solitary  exaltation,  and  •; 
cares  not  for  us,  and  a])out  whom  we  need  not  care !  How 
much  worthier,  grander,  fuller  of  life ;  in  a  word,  how 
much  more  God-like,  is  the  conception  of  God  presented 
us  in  the  Bible !  Here  we  have  the  living  God,  who  not 
merely  in  eternal  majesty  is  enthroned  above  the  world, 
but  also  in  eternal  activity  works  everywhere  through  the 
world,  as  the  God  who  dwells  in  the  world.  The  truth 
which  pantheism  and  deism  have  rent  in  twain  and  divided 
between  them,  so  that  one  knows  only  the  internal,  world- 
pervading  God,  the  other  only  the  external,  world-tran- 
scending God,  Christianity  comprehends  in  one.  It  calls 
him,  in  a  single  proposition,  ''the  God  who  is  above  all 
and  through  all  and  in  all."  And  as  positively  as  it 
aflSrms,  "  He  dwells  in  light  which  no  man  can  approach 
unto,"  with  equal  emphasis  does  it  declare,  "  He  is  not  far 
from  every  one  of  us ;  in  him  we  live  and  move  and  have 
our  being."  Everywhere  it  unites  the  God  above  nature 
with  the  God  in  nature.  Everything  to  be  seen  or  heard 
or  felt  in  nature  is  to  it  not  merely  an  efiect  which  has 
proceeded  distantly  from  God,  which  must  be  traced  back 

1 "  Was  war'  ein  Gott,  der  nur  von  Aussen  stiesso, 
Im  Kreis  das  All  am  Finger  laufen  liesse  ? 
Ihm  ziemt'e,  die  Welt  im  Innern  zu  bewegen, 
Natur  in  eich,  sich  in  Natur  zu  hegen, 
So  dass,  was  in  ihm  lebt  und  webt  und  ist, 
Nie  seine  Kraft,  nie  seinen  Geist  vermisst  I " 

—  OOTX  UNT>  WEIiV. 


MIRACLES  161 

along  the  threads  of  the  natural  laws  and  forces  to  the 
beginning  of  the  world,  to  find  for  it  a  connection  with 
God,  but  is  an  immediate  manifestation  of  the  invisible 
power  and  Godhead.  God  it  is  who  rides  upon  the  wings 
of  the  wind,  who  speaks  in  the  storm  and  thunder,  who 
shines  and  blesses  in  the  light.  God,  who  is  above  all,  is 
also  in  all ;  upon  even  the  natural  event  rests  a  breath  of 
the  supernatural,  of  the  miraculous,  as  far  as  it  reminds  us 
of  the  divine  power  immediatel}^  ruling  therein.  The  God 
of  the  Bible  is  not  a  God  who,  after  he  had  created,  retired 
to  a  place  of  rest ;  but  he  is  the  all-pervading  life,  the  all- 
overruling  power.  "  Upholding  all  things  by  the  word  of 
his  power,"  is  the  declaration  of  Scripture ;  and  the  words 
of  the  Lord  to  the  Jews  who  supposed  the  Sabbath  of  God 
was  an  end  of  all  his  work  are,  "  My  Father  worketh  hith- 
erto." Put  these  two  ideas  together,  "  God  above  all," 
and  "  God  in  aU,"  rise  to  the  Bible's  conception  of  the  liv- 
ing God,  then  the  idea  of  a  miracle  has  nothing  in  it  ob- 
jectionable or  difiicult  to  our  thinking.  Miracles  then 
become  matters  in  the  higher  sense  altogether  natural. 

Should  any  one,  however,  be  as  yet  unwilling  to  concede 
to  the  Biblical  view  of  the  world,  compared  with  that  of 
deism,  the  right  in  point  of  truth,  but  should  ask  for  farther 
proof,  then  we  answer  :  the  entire  constitution  of  the  world, 
of  nature,  as  also  of  the  human  heart,  decides  for  the  Bible 
and  against  deism.  How,  then,  is  nature  constituted? 
Reigns  there  in  it  actually  the  stiff,  iron  legalism  which  ab- 
solutely excludes  the  free  ruling  and  interposition  of  God  ? 
Assuredly  not.  Plan  there  is  and  order,  certainly,  in  the 
whole  course  of  nature,  but  no  stiff  sameness,  no  unbending 
necessity.  Nature  is  by  no  means  a  mechanism,  a  nicely 
defined  piece  of  clock-work,  which  winds  itself  up  every  day 
or  every  year;  but  it  resembles   a  well-ordered  common- 


162  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

wealth,  in  which  laws  reign,  most  surely,  but  such  laws  as 
leave  play-room  for  the  free  will.  And  so  nature  must  be 
constituted,  if  it  is  to  be  the  dwelling-place  of  man,  of 
man  endowed  with  free-will.  Only  when  so  constituted 
can  it  allow  in  it  the  exercise  of  a  will  that  chooses  among 
different  possibilities  and  controls  the  event  in  nature  to 
the  attaining  of  its  purposes.  But  if  the  free  action  of  the 
human  will  is  recognized,  and  room  is  found  for  it  inside 
the  laws  of  nature,  why  should  just  the  Creator  be  excluded 
from  such  free  action  and  ruling?  As  man  in  a  peculiar 
way  combines  and  disposes  the  forces  in  nature  to  his  pur- 
poses, so  that  a  result  is  produced  which  would  never  have 
been  produced  from  the  mere  working  together  of  the  nat- 
ural laws,  so,  only  in  an  infinitely  higher  sense,  God  dis- 
poses the  event  in  the  world  to  his  purposes.  Is  this  a 
little  view  of  God?  Must  it  be  said,  "Why  did  he  not 
constitute  his  work  better,  that  he  must  constantly  amend?  " 
This  objection  would  be  just,  if  nature  were  only  a  mechan- 
ism, without  aim  and  without  a  free  man  in  it ;  it  falls  to 
the  ground,  because  nature  is  something  nobler,  —  a  theatre 
for  free  acts,  the  human  and  the  divine. 

The  entire  constitution  of  the  world,  consequently,  does 
not  exclude  the  free  ruling  of  God,  the  divine  government 
of  the  world  ;  on  the  contrary,  it  is  so  devised  as  from  the 
beginning  to  have  had  that  in  view.  And  further  we  say  : 
the  human  heart,  also,  is  so  constituted,  that  it  must  believe 
in  the  world-ruling  God,  as  long  as  it  believes  itself.  The 
human  heart,  as  soon  as  it  knows  of  a  Creator  and  Lord  of 
the  world,  cannot  help  praying  to  this  God.  That  would 
be  an  absurdity  and  a  contradiction,  if  the  course  of  the 
world  occurs  according  to  unalterable  laws,  which  form  an 
insurmountable  barrier  even  for  God ;  if  everything  pro- 
ceeds according  to  blind   necessity.     But  this  the  inner- 


MIRACLES  163 

most  voice  of  our  own  nature,  of  which  we  have  the  Immediate 
assurance  it  cannot  deceive,  tells  us  that  God's  hands  are 
not  bound  by  natural  law,  but  that  he  freely  rules  the  world 
and  directs  all  according  to  his  counsel.  Therefore  we  pray. 
Can  that  be  delusion  ?  Can  this  prayer-impulse,  with  which 
every  man,  even  the  denier  of  miracles,  is  involuntarily  af- 
fected, when  trouble  presses  hard  upon  the  soul,  —  can  it  be 
deception,  or  as  the  catching  of  a  drowning  man  at  a  straw? 
No  !  it  is  a  remnant  of  the  truth  in  the  human  heart,  which, 
when  the  earnestness  of  life  brushes  from  the  eyes  the  cob- 
webs of  idle  theories,  stands  out  distinct  and  clear  before 
the  spirit.  This  is  the  remnant  of  truth  which,  after  every 
suppression,  rises  again,  and  bursts  through  all  doubts,  de- 
nials, and  negations ;  the  remnant  of  truth,  without  which 
human  life  would  be  comfortless  and  hopeless,  a  lightless 
wandering  in  darkness.  Where  is  there  a  praying  heart,  to 
which  its  experience  would  not  with  a  thousand  voices  at- 
test, Prayers  have  their  influence ;  they  do  not,  as  sound, 
die  away  in  empty  space  ?  That  could  not  be  if  the  world's 
course  were  a  mere  mechanism. 

True,  one  could  say,  God's  government  of  the  world 
keeps  within  the  limits  of  the  laws  of  nature,  and  consists 
in  only  a  free-ruling  combination  of  the  results  which  these 
produce  ;  it  is  a  guiding  and  adjusting  of  the  course  of  na- 
ture, but  no  actual  interposition  in  it,  no  proper  miracle. 
Here  natural  law  is  nowhere  violated  and  set  aside,  but 
all  takes  place  naturally.  "Well,  but  yet  belief  in  the  di- 
vine government  of  the  world  is  a  prelude  to  a  belief  in  mir- 
acles in  a  narrower  sense,  and  leads  thereto.  For  the  di- 
vine government  is  after  all  a  miracle  in  the  wider  sense ; 
it  cannot  be  understood  from  mere  natural  law.  It  proves 
the  free  ruling  of  the  supermundane  God  in  the  world,  and 
comes  often  so  strikingly  before  the  eyes,  e.  g.,  in  sudden 


164  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

and  manifest  punishments  of  an  offender,  in  astonishing  de- 
liverances and  preservations,  that  we  must  even  then,  when  all 
has  occurred  within  the  laws  of  nature,  involuntarily  exclaim, 
"  How  miraculous  !  " 

From  this  point  it  is  only  a  step  to  a  miracle  in  the 
strictest  sense  of  the  word,  consequently  to  such  occur- 
rences as  the  Bible  narrates  in  such  profusion,  where  the 
natural  law  seems  to  be  transgressed,  as  in  the  raising  of 
the  dead,  the  changing  of  water  into  wine,  the  multiplica 
tion  of  loaves,  etc.  Here  the  objection  rises  with  increased 
strength :  God  cannot  violate  his  own  order ;  the  natural 
law  was  established  by  him ;  how  could  he  overturn  and 
abolish  it,  without  setting  himself  in  contradiction  with 
himself,  without  converting  the  order  into  wild  disorder  ? 
We  could,  in  the  first  place,  reply,  Is  God  not  master  of 
his  own  work,  that  he  may  do  with  it  what  he  will?  Is  he 
not  Lord  in  his  own  house,  and  is  the  regulation  which  he 
has  established  for  his  house  as  binding  upon  himself  as  on 
the  house?  Can  he  not,  in  special  cases,  and  for  special 
purposes,  instead  of  the  customary  regulation,  introduce  a 
higher  one  which  sets  the  former  aside  ?  And  is  disorder 
produced  by  the  lower  regulation's  yielding  to  a  higher? 
When,  on  Sunday  or  holiday,  the  work-day  rule  of  the  house 
is  suspended,  and  one  aiming  at  higher  ends  becomes  oper- 
ative in  its  place,  is  confusion  caused  thereby  in  the  house? 
Does  the  lawgiver  come  into  contradiction  with  himself 
when  he  excepts  the  particular  case  from  the  general  law, 
and  puts  it  under  a  particular  law  ?  And  is  the  general  law 
thereby  abrogated  ?  By  no  means.  It  remains  good  for  its 
domain  and  loses  no  particle  of  its  validity.  Surely,  if  it  is 
God  who  has  established  the  laws  of  nature  and  subjected 
all  events  to  them,  it  is  manifest  that  he  is  excepted  who 
did  subject  all  to  them.  And  even  for  the  case  where  it 
would  be  necessary  to  say,  the  miracle  contradicts  the  law 


MIRACLES  165 

of  nature,  and  it  cannot  be  otherwise  conceived  of  than 
that  the  essence  and  the  properties  of  matter,  at  the  instant 
when  the  miracle  occurs,  are  changed  into  their  opposite, — 
even  then  belief  in  such  a  temporary  setting  aside  and 
changing  of  the  elements  has  nothing  in  it  suspicious  for 
him  who  really  believes  that  God,  the  Creator  of  matter,  is, 
in  consequence,  absolutely  master  of  it. 

But  we  do  not  need  that.  It  is  altogether  unnecessary 
and  incorrect  to  affirm  that  a  miracle  contradicts  the  order 
of  nature.  This  hypothesis  results  from  the  erroneous 
idea  that  God  and  the  world  are  absolutely  separated  from 
each  other,  and  that  the  world  over  against  the  Creator  has 
an  entirely  independent  existence.  Is  it  so,  then,  tha* 
with  a  miracle  something  foreign  and  hostile  enters  by 
force  into  the  connection  of  nature  from  without,  something 
whereby  this  connection  is  disturbed,  torn,  and  violated, 
whereb}",  so  to  speak,  a  rent  is  made  in  the  nexus  rerum? 
This  is  not  at  all  the  Biblical  conception  of  the  matter. 
God  through  all  and  in  all,  says  the  Scripture ;  all  has  not 
merely  its  origin  from  God,  but  also  its  continuance  in 
God.  He  upholds  all  things  by  the  word  of  his  power ; 
all  things  are,  live,  and  move  only  in  him.  That  is  to  say, 
no  natural  force  and  no  natural  law  has  an  existence  in- 
dependent of  and  separated  from  God,  but  all  is  pervaded 
and  upheld,  animated  and  energized,  by  him  who  created  it. 
All  the  natural  forces  are  inserted  in  the  living  original 
force,  from  which  they  continuall}^  draw  their  life ;  and 
they  work  only  because  the  original  force,  which  is  itself 
the  life,  upholds  them.  All  the  natural  laws  are  inserted 
in  the  living  original  law,  in  the  will  of  God ;  and  they 
hold  good  only  so  far  as  they  are  upheld  by  the  will  of 
God.  The  divine  power  and  will,  these  are,  on  the  one 
hand,  the  energy  enthroned  above  and  before  all  the  world, 


166  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

the  energy  which  created  all ;  these  are,  on  the  other  hand, 
the  living-principle  concealed  in  the  world,  and  lying  at 
the  basis  of  all  the  life  of  the  world,  the  principle  in  which 
all  is  rooted,  by  which  all  is  upheld,  without  which  it  would 
not  exist.  This  is  the  point  to  be  urged,  if  the  Bible 
miracles  are  not  to  be  to  us  a  stone  of  stumbling ;  the 
divine  creative  power  we  must  recognize  as  the  power  of 
all  life  in  tlie  world,  as  the  energy  working  in  and  through 
all.  Hence  it  is  said,  in  the  Lord's  prayer,  "  Thine  is  the 
power,"  i.  e.,  the  absolute  power,  embracing  all  powers, 
the  original  force  which  constantly  puts  forth  from  itself 
all  individual  forces,  which  makes  alive  and  keeps  alive 
all  causes,  means,  and  instruments.  Therefore,  the  Lord 
makes  it  a  reproach  to  the  miracle-denying  Sadducean 
spirit :  "  Ye  know  not  the  power  of  God."  Consequently, 
it  IS  not  true  that  the  natural  forces  work  their  natural 
products  without  God,  by  themselves,  in  their  own  power 
and  wisdom ;  but  all  natural  forces  have  their  life-root  in 
God's  creative  power,  and  it  is  his  power  and  wisdom 
working  in  them  which  makes  it  possible  and  necessary  for 
them  to  produce  this  and  that,  so  and  otherwise.  All 
these  individual  forces,  however,  which  in  nature  are  dis- 
tributed according  to  kind,  place,  and  time,  God  has  for- 
ever united  in  his  divine  power,  which  is  the  life  of  all 
forces  and  the  rule  of  all  products ;  and  from  the  fulness 
of  this  power,  which  flows  everywhere  through  the  world  as 
its  inner  life-energy,  he  can  at  once,  without  the  media- 
tion of  the  individual  forces,  set  forth  something  new, 
which  is  a  manifest  miracle,  as  the  ordinary  phenomena, 
which  he  sets  forth  gradually  by  means  of  the  natural 
forces  and  laws,  are  a  concealed  miracle. 

How  can  an  abolishing  of  the  order  of  nature,  a  con- 
tradiction of  natural  law,  a  destruction  of  natural  force,  a 


MIRACLES  167 

rending  of  the  connection  of  nature,  be  spoken  of  here? 
These  disparagements  do  not  apply  to  the  Biblical  view. 
The  highest  law,  the  common  law,  in  which  all  individual 
laws  are  included,  and  from  which  each  of  them  is  only  an 
emanation,  is  the  will  of  God ;    anything  taking  place  in 
accordance  with  this  can  contradict  no  law  of  nature,  be- 
cause it  accords  with  the  law  of  all  laws.     And  if,  instead 
of  the  individual  forces,  the  common  force  operates,  the 
original  force,  which   upholds   and   includes   in  itself  all 
forces,  how  could  this  make  a  disharmony  in  the  working- 
together  of  the  forces?    Then  would  it  needs  be  a  dishar- 
mony, whenever,  in  a  piece  of  music,  through  the  play  of 
the  notes,  the  key-note  sounds  full  and  clear?    And  is  this 
a  rending  of  the  connection  of  nature,  when  precisely  that 
which  upholds  and  moves  the  whole  course  of  nature,  the 
all-pervading  and  all-energizing  power  of  God,  makes  its 
appearance  ?    Assuredly  the  miracles  of  God  are  not  dis- 
turbances and  disorders,  but  precisely  the  high  and  shining 
points   of   the   course   of  nature,  where   it  celebrates   its 
festivals.     The  miracles  are  not  something  unnatural  and 
against  nature,  but  the  supernatural  beaming  forth  from 
the  innermost  life-ground  of  nature.     Not  something  for- 
eign and  heterogeneous  is  here  violently  introduced  into 
it  from  without,  but  its  own  innermost  life-spirit,  which  is 
the  secret  of  its  being,  comes  out  into  the  realm  of  the 
visible,  the  divine  creative  power.     As  the  electric  current, 
which  passes  through  a  body,  under  certain  circumstances, 
concentrates  and  emits  sparks,  so  with  the  divine  power, 
which,  as  the  breath  of  life,  pervades  all.     Its  concentra- 
tions, its  scintillations,  these  are  the  miracles  in  nature. 
These  are  the  clear  flashings  of  the  Creative  Spirit  through 
the  veil  of  matter,  while  in  the  ordinary  course  of  things 
it  only  shimmers  through  the  natural  event  as  a  soft,  mild 


168  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

radiance.  But  we  say  still  more.  We  heighten  the  affirma- 
tion  :  the  world's  course  endures  miracles  without  forsaking 
its  poles,  to  the  other;  the  world's  course  requires  miracles 
—  miracles  are  not  merely  possible,  but  also  necessary ; 
by  which,  it  is  true,  we  have  not,  first  of  all,  thought 
of  the  individual  miracles,  but  of  the  chief  miracle  of 
revelation,  of  the  connected  history  of  miracles,  which 
has  its  central  point  in  the  person  of  Jesus  Christ,  in 
which,  however,  as  we  shall  directly  see,  the  individual 
miracles,  the  sensuous  nature-signs,  have  their  necessary 
place. 

The  world's  course  requires  miracles.  For,  without  a 
miracle,  there  could  be  no  development  from  the  lower  to 
the  higher,  no  progression  towards  an  end,  but  only 
standing  still  or  a  moving  about  in  a  circle.  Develop- 
ments appear  only  when  new  germs  and  beginnings,  new 
life  potencies,  insert  themselves  into  the  connection  of 
things,  which  give  to  the  stream  of  the  world's  course  new 
motion  and  direction ;  were  it  not  for  these,  it  would 
become  a  stagnating  bog,  a  dead  sea.  These  new  life- 
germs  and  potencies,  however,  do  not  result  from  that 
which  already  exists ;  they  are  no  product  of  the  already 
given  forces  and  conditions  of  the  natural  life,  but  they 
enter  by  a  free  creative  act  of  God  into  the  world,  insert 
themselves  however  instantly  into  the  regular  procession 
of  things  without  interruption  and  break,  without  noise  and 
tumult.  In  a  word,  they  are  miracles,  no  product  of  the 
natural  forces,  but  an  immediate  gift  of  God,  and  just  this 
is  the  leaven  which  brings  the  mass  into  fermentation  and 
motion,  which  furnishes  the  possibility  of  a  progressive 
development. 

So  it  is  already  in  the  history  of  creation.  The  entire 
creative  act  divides  itself  into  a  series  of  development- 


MIRACLES  169 

periods,  —  the  Biblical  record  calls  them  days^  —  each  of 
which  is  ushered  in  by  a  "Let  there  be!"  With  every 
'*  Let  there  be  "  a  new  life-potency  enters  into  what  at  the 
time  exists,  and  calls  forth  new  developments,  which  go 
on  according  to  law.  Thus  it  comes  continually  to  a 
higher  grade  of  being,  from  the  inorganic  to  the  organic, 
from  the  vegetable  to  the  animal,  until  at  last  the  highest 
earthly  grade  of  life,  man,  is  reached.  But  even  with 
the  conclusion  of  the  creative  work,  there  is  in  existence  by 
no  means  an  absolutel}?-  perfect  world  ;  for  perfection  is  not 
the  beginning,  but  the  end,  and  from  that  beginning  to 
this  end  leads  only  the  way  of  development.  All  is, 
indeed,  after  creation  is  completed,  very  good;  that,  how- 
ever, does  not  signify  absolutely  perfect,  but  suited  to  the 
end  for  which  it  is  designed.  So  with  man  himself;  he 
is  not  created  for  rest,  for  passive  existence,  but  he 
receives  a  commission :  he  must  build  and  preserve  ;  he  is 
bid  and  forbid, — what  else  does  this  mean  than  that  he  is 
called  to  development?  He  must  as  a  free  being  gradu- 
ally unfold  himself  according  to  the  divine  idea  lying  at 
the  basis  of  his  being ;  and  with  him  nature,  whose  head 
and  centre  he  is.  This  development-course,  even  if  it 
had  proceeded  normally,  without  departure  from  the 
original  idea,  could  have  taken  place  only  under  contin- 
ually new  supplies  of  life  ;  it  must  necessarily  have  had  its 
nodal  points,  where  something  new  entered  into  the  old,  as 
the  immediate  work  of  God.  Possibly  even  the  Scripture 
hints  at  this,  when  it  speaks  of  the  intercourse  of  God  with 
man  in  paradise. 

How  much  more  intense  mkacles  will  the  world's  course 
require,  to  reach  the  divine  end  of  creation,  after  it  has  gone 
aside  from  the  straight  line  of  normal  development  and  by 
man's  sin  has  become  distorted !     This  is  the  crying  fact 


170  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

which  every  look  into  the  history  of  the  world  and  of  man, 
every  look  into  our  own  hearts,  attests  to  us,  that  the 
course  of  the  human  race's  development  is  a  maze  of  mis- 
used freedom,  an  abnormal,  sinful  course,  and,  therefore, 
one  tending  to  ruin,  —  a  course  which  not  only  admits  of  a 
saving  interposition  of  God,  but  as  a  work  of  mercy  most 
urgently  demands  this.  On  the  basis  of  the  natural  life,  if 
the  death-process  into  which  it  has  fallen  is  not  to  lead  to 
destruction  and  dissolution,  a  new  life  process  must  take 
place,  a  new,  higher  history,  which  does  not  grow  up  from 
the  death-kingdom  of  this  world,  but  from  above  is  woven 
into  the  web  of  the  world's  course,  consequently  a  miracle- 
history  in  the  highest  sense  of  the  word.  This  is  the 
deepest  need  of  the  world  and  of  human  nature.  For  that 
help  from  above  the  whole  cosmos  lying  under  the  ban  of 
sin  and  death  cries  and  calls,  as  a  prisoner  cries  for 
deliverance.  And  to  meet  this  need  is  something  contrary 
to  nature,  is  a  violent,  disturbing  interposition?  Then  it 
is  also  a  contrariety  to  nature  and  an  act  of  violence, 
when,  at  the  right  time,  the  hand  of  the  physician  admin- 
isters to  the  death-sick  human  body  the  healing  forces, 
which  not  only  arrest  the  process  of  death,  but  convert  it 
into  that  of  convalescence  ! 

And,  thank  God,  this  miraculous  working  of  God,  the 
necessity  of  which  is  as  firmly  established  as  is  its  possibil- 
ity, has  also  become  actual  fact.  Into  the  world's  history 
of  sin  and  death  the  golden  threads  of  the  history  of  sal- 
vation have  been  interwoven,  a  continued  chain  of  divine 
acts  of  revelation  for  the  saving  of  the  world,  which  form  a 
living  organism  of  miracles.  The  record  of  this  continued 
history  of  miracles  is  the  Scripture  of  the  Old  and  New 
Testaments  ;  its  culminating  point  is  Jesus  Christ,  in  whom 
not  merely  individual  beams  of  the  divine  li^ht  and  life,  but 


MIRACLES  171 

all  the  fulness  of  the  Godhead  bodily  enters  into  the  world, 
and,  placed  under  the  law,  interweaves  a  divine-human  his- 
tory of  life  into  the  world's  history  of  death.  And,  in 
turn,  the  culminating  point  of  this  divine-human  history  of 
life,  the  crown  and  pearl  of  all  miracles,  in  which  the  whole 
miracle-structure  of  the  divine  history  of  revelation  reaches 
its  pinnacle,  is  the  resurrection  of  Jesus  Christ,  this  banner 
of  our  faith,  with  which  Christianity  stands  and  falls  ;  this 
sum  of  the  Gospel,  which  from  Easter  to  Easter,  from  Sun- 
day to  Sunday,  is  preached  and  celebrated  in  the  Christian 
church. 

These  facts  of  the  history  of  salvation  yield  to  none  of 
the  world's  history  in  point  of  historic  actuality  and  cer- 
tainty. They  are  attested  in  the  surest  manner  by  the  most 
trustworthy  witnesses  and  testimonies,  which  no  historico- 
critical  investigation  has  yet  been  able  to  impeach.  "  This 
Jesus  hath  God  raised  up,  whereof  we  are  all  witnesses ;" 
"  We  declare  that  which  we  have  heard,  which  we  have 
seen  with  our  eyes,  which  we  have  looked  upon  and  our 
hands  have  handled, "  —  so  speak  the  witnesses  of  divine 
revelation,  with  a  calmness  and  veracity  which  remain  un- 
shaken in  the  midst  of  ignominy,  bonds,  and  death.  Must 
it  not  be  said,  if  such  testimonies  are  worth  nothing,  then 
no  testimony  in  the  world  is  of  any  worth,  then  every  other 
historical  fact  can  with  equal  propriety  be  rejected?  and 
bare  arbitrariness  is  set  upon  the  thi'one !  But  men  can 
appreciate  the  force  of  these  external  testimonies,  in  a 
dozen  other  instances  ;  on  much  less  important  testimony, 
they  can  account  a  matter  true ;  but  precisely  in  matters  of 
the  history  of  divine  salvation  there  will  be  no  end  of 
doubting  and  disputing.  Here  no  witnesses  suffice,  none 
of  all  the  unnumbered  host  who  from  the  times  of  the 
apostles  by  greatness  of  spirit  tower  above  ordinary  men 


172  THE   BREMEN    LECTURES 

and  shine  down  through  all  the  centuries  ;  in  a  dream  and 
delusion  they  have  all  been  ensnared  !  Why  this  diflSculty 
of  believing,  this  stubborn  skepticism  in  matters  of  divine 
revelation?  Just  because  the  history  of  revelation  is 
entirely  different  in  character  from  whatever  else  human 
history  presents.  In  this  appears  only  the  transitory  world- 
life,  which  is  infected  with  sin  and  subjected  to  death ;  but 
there  the  superterrestrial  life  makes  its  appearance,  which 
was  lost  in  the  history  of  the  world,  but  for  that  very  rea- 
fion  had  to  be  planted  in  it  anew.  Such  a  life  must  neces- 
sarily have  a  peculiar  character  and  history,  in  which  every- 
where its  supraterrestrial  nature  gleams  through.  There- 
fore the  history  of  divine  revelation,  especially  the  history 
and  being  of  Jesus  Christ,  cannot  be  understood,  believed, 
and  laid  hold  of  by  man,  so  long  as  his  sense,  and  with  that 
his  understanding,  remains  fixed  on  the  things  of  earth. 
There  are  inner  grounds,  grounds  in  his  entire  method  of 
thinking  and  perceiving,  which  cause  that  to  appear  to  him 
impossible,  in  spite  of  all  external  evidences,  which  is  so 
entirely  foreign  to  the  products  of  the  world,  in  which  ex- 
clusively he  lives.  Hence  no  arguing  and  proving  from 
external  grounds  ever  helps  one  from  unbelief  to  faith ; 
but,  if  man  would  understand  God's  truth,  he  must  consent 
to  a  change  of  mind.  He  must  allow  himself  to  be  con- 
ducted from  the  outer  world  to  the  inner,  and,  instead  of 
investigating  the  history  of  the  external  world  and  nature, 
he  must  study  the  history  of  his  heart  and  inner  life.  Here 
is  the  tribunal  where  the  right  witnesses  and  judges  can  be 
found  ;  where  to  every  one  his  sins  and  mistakes,  his  losses 
and  deficiencies,  make  themselves  apparent ;  where  all  the 
secret  troubles,  diseases,  and  needs  of  human  nature  come 
to  view.  But  so  also  in  the  interior  of  every  man  the  traces 
of  the  divine  image  buried  within  him  reveal  themselves. 


MIRACLES  173 

which,  under  all  the  pressure  of  the  external  world,  contin- 
ually awaken  in  the  deepest  grounds  of  our  being  a  longing 
for,  an  anticipation  of,  and  a  struggling  after  the  supermun- 
dane life,  for  which  we  are  designed.  He  who  thus  searches 
in  himself,  not  merely  in  nature  and  the  world,  and  takes 
along  with  him  in  his  search  Him  who  searches  through  all, 
—  he  who  accepts  and  cultivates  the  sense  for  it,  —  he  learns 
to  view  divine  revelation  and  Him  who  is  its  centre,  Jesus ' 
Christ,  the  life  of  eternity  come  down  from  above ;  learns  to 
believe  in,  love,  and  understand  him,  and  so  becomes  a  par- 
taker of  his  superterrestrial  life.  Such  a  person  believes 
in  miracles ;  for  he  has  experienced  in  himself  one  of  the 
greatest  of  miracles,  —  regeneration  from  death  to  life. 

Henceforward,  as  may  be  said  in  conclusion,  faith  and 
understanding  open  for  the  sensuous  miracle-signs  in  the 
realm  of  the  natural  life,  with  which  divine  revelation  is  at- 
tended on  its  passage  through  the  history  of  the  world. 
What  are  the^^,  and  what  do  they  signify?  Certainly,  we 
must  not  force  them  up  too  high.  They  are  not  primary  in 
importance,  but  secondary ;  not  the  chief  thing,  but  only 
the  signs  following  in  the  train  of  revelation.  We  believe 
not  on  account  of  these  miracles  in  Jesus  Christ,  but  the 
reverse ;  on  account  of  Jesus  Christ  we  believe  the  mira- 
cles. And  only  so  far  as  they  are  related  to  him,  the 
living  heart-centre  of  revelation,  are  they  a  subject  of 
,our  faith.  On  the  other  hand,  however,  they  are  no  super- 
fluous ornament,  no  arbitrary  embellishment  of  the  history 
of  revelation,  no  mere  display,  the  object  of  which  is  to 
charm  and  gratify  the  senses,  but  they  have  a  holy  purpose  to 
subserve  in  the  interest  of  revelation ;  and  therein  consists 
their  necessity.  Jesus  himself  repels  most  decidedly  the 
curiosity  which  desires  to  see  miracles  merely  for  the 
miracles'  sake,  wherever  it  meets  him.     His  miracles  always 


174  THE   BREMEN    LECTURES 

have  in  view  a  moral  aim,  and  indeed  the  same  which  is 
had  in  view  by  revelation  throughout,  —  the  inner  renewal 
of  man.  This  gives  his  miracles  that  peculiar  mark  of  holi- 
ness by  which  they  are  so  essentially  distinguished  from  the 
strange  and  fantastic  wonders  described  in  the  Apocryphal 
Gospels.  His  miracles  are  no  arbitrary  feats  of  power,  but 
acts  of  wisdom  and  love  designed  to  subserve  his  work  as 
the  Saviour  of  the  souls  of  men.  And  what  does  this  mean  ? 
In  the  original  language  of  the  New  Testament,  the  mira- 
cles are  called  (Trj/xsla,  signs.  A  sign,  however,  exists  not  for 
itself,  it  is  not  an  end ;  but  it  exists  for  the  sake  of  that 
which  is  intended  to  be  signified,  represented,  pictured 
thereby.  Its  object  is  to  turn  attention  to  that,  not  to  fix 
it  upon  itself.  A  sign  is  the  visible  likeness  of  something 
invisible.  So  also  the  miracles  of  the  Scriptures  are  only 
pictures,  by  which  the  spiritual  meaning  of  divine  revela- 
tion mirrors  itself  in  the  world  of  sense ;  they  are  reflections 
of  the  spirit  in  the  realm  of  nature.  And  so  the  sensuous 
miracle  speaks  to  man,  who,  in  consequence  of  his  bodily 
nature,  is  most  closely  connected  with  the  entire  world  ol 
sense,  and  is  in  his  natural  condition  preponderantly  set 
thereto ;  it  speaks  to  him  a  grand  language  of  signs,  by  which 
the  mystery  of  the  regeneration,  of  the  spiritual  salva- 
tion and  redemption  at  which  divine  revelation  aims,  is 
designed  to  be  symbolized  to  him.  On  the  basis  of  these 
signs  the  dim  feeling  of  the  supersensuous  is  to  be  cleared 
up  to  complete  understanding,  the  mysterious  yearning  for 
it  is  to  be  strengthened  and  quickened  to  positive  endeavor ; 
and  so  they  become  the  pioneers  which  direct  from  the 
outward  to  the  inward. 

And  with  this  directing  inwardly  they  connect  a  direct- 
ing to  the  future ;  as  they  are  a  symbol  of  the  spiritual 
renewal  which  can,  and  should  even  now,  be  taking  place^ 


MIRACLES  175 

SO  they  are  also  a  prophecy  of  the  bodily  perfecting  and 
glorifying  which  is  the  end  of  the  ways  of  God.  The 
Scripture  speaks  of  a  future  redemption  of  the  body  which 
is  designed  for  the  children  of  God,  and  in  connection 
therewith  of  a  future  glorifying  of  nature,  when  the  creature 
also  shall  be  delivered  from  the  bondage  of  corruption, 
from  the  oppression  of  evil,  and  from  the  ban  of  death.  It 
speaks  of  a  regeneration  of  the  entire  world,  of  a  new 
heaven  and  a  new  earth,  where  there  shall  be  no  more 
death,  neither  sorrow,  nor  pain,  nor  crying.  And  to  this 
it  must  at  some  time  come.  The  spirit  must  yet  be  in- 
vested with  corresponding  body ;  the  kingdom  of  heaven, 
which  now  is  internal  and  invisible,  must  yet  become  also 
external,  and  transform  even  nature  into  a  kingdom  of 
glory.  Of  this  future  glory  the  miracles  of  the  Bible  are 
individual  prefiguring  beams.  These  acts  of  healing,  these 
resurrections  of  the  dead,  —  these  are  designed  to  say  to 
us  that  the  same  power  and  grace  of  God  which  now  are 
working  salvation  in  our  souls  will  at  some  future  time 
work  the  same  also  in  our  mortal  bodies ;  —  and  as  it  is 
now  said  of  the  redeemed  human  heart,  it  is  a  temple  of 
God,  so  it  will  also  be  said  hereafter  of  our  entire  earth, 
''  Behold,  the  tabernacle  of  God  is  with  men  !  " 

This  language  of  the  external  miracles,  however,  man 
*vill  not  understand,  unless  the  Spirit  of  miracles,  the 
renewing  Spirit  of  God,  dwells  in  him,  and  he  has,  in  the 
power  of  the  same,  experienced  that  internal  spiritual 
miracle  of  which  the  Scripture  says,  ''  God  hath  quickened 
us  together  with  Christ,  and  together  with  him  hath  raised 
us  up  and  made  us  sit  in  heavenly  places."  This  internal 
experimental  proof  it  is  which  outweighs  and  makes  dis 
pensable  all  other  proofs,  and  which,  in  spite  of  all  th(; 
contradictions  of  natural  science  and  of  the  modern  con 


176  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

sciousness,  puts  in  the  mouth  the  confident  confession 
which  once  the  heathen  king  Darius  learned  to  repeat  after 
the  prophet  Daniel,  "He  is  the  living  God,  who  worketh 
signs  and  wonders  in  heaven  and  on  earth." 


LECTURE  V 
THE  PERSON  OF  JESUS  CHRIST 

By  CHR.  E.  LUTHARDT,  D.  D. 

PROFESSOR  OF   THEOLOGY  AT  LEIPSIC 


CHR.  E.  LUTHARDT,  D.  D. 


BIOGEAPHIOAL 


Dr.  Christoph  Ernst  Luthardt  is,  in  this  country,  one  of  the 
best  known  of  the  recent  great  German  scholars  and  theolo- 
gians. Besides  being  the  author  of  many  publications  on  a 
wide  range  of  topics,  quite  a  number  of  which  have  been  trans- 
lated into  English,  he  is  in  Germany  especially  renowned  as  a 
university  lecturer  and  pulpit  orator.  His  style  is  very  lucid, 
logical,  sometimes  eloquent,  and  of  all  the  writers  in  this  book 
he  is  one  of  the  easiest  to  translate.  He  was  born  at  Marolds- 
weisach,  in  Bavaria,  March  22,  1823.  He  studied  at  Erlangen 
and  Berlin,  and  was  ordained  at  Miinden,  in  1846.  From  that 
date  until  1851  he  was  teacher  in  the  gymnasium  at  Munich, 
and  was  afterward  repetent  at  Erlangen  and  pr^'vai-cfoce/i^  in  the 
same  place.  Still  later  he  w^as  professor  extraordinary  at  Mar- 
burg, and  in  1856  he  became  professor  of  systematic  theology 
and  New  Testament  exegesis  at  Leipsic.  During  his  long  lit- 
erary career  he  has  been  the  editor  of  several  German  religious 
journals.  In  1865  he  was  made  consistorial  councilor.  The 
following  may  be  mentioned  as  among  the  works  from  Dr. 
Luthardt's  pen  which  have  been  translated  into  English  :  ''  Fun- 
damental Truths  of  Christianity,"  **  Saving  Truths  of  Chris- 
tianity," "Moral  Truths  of  Christianity,"  ''The  Johannine  Ori- 
gin of  the  Fourth  Gospel,"  "St.  John's  Gospel  Described  and 
Explained  According  to  Its  Peculiar  Character,"  "History  of 
Christian  Ethics  Before  the  Reformation." 


SUMMAET  OF  LEOTUEE  V 


The  person  of  Jesus  Christ  is  the  highest  theme  and  the  com- 
mon object  of  sacred  interest  to  universal  Christendom — Call- 
ing upon  the  name  of  Jesus  is  the  badge  of  every  Christian — 
The  question  about  Christ  is  the  underlying  one  of  all — Some- 
thing mysterious  in  Jesus'  person  and  whole  appearance — Napo- 
leon's skeptical  utterance  at  Weimar  put  in  contrast  with  his 
believing  testimony  on  St.  Helena — Jesus  Christ  is  a  historical 
fact,  that  is  the  first  point — The  next  point  is,  Jesus  was  a 
teacher,  a  founder  of  religion — Eejected  by  his  own  people,  he 
has  become  an  object  of  attraction  to  all  nations — What  is  the 
mystery  of  his  person  ? — That  he  was  a  man,  we  all  know — That 
he  was  no  ordinary  man,  is  admitted  by  all  the  intelligent,  and 
the  church  sets  him  upon  the  throne  of  God — What  does  he  sav 
of  himself? — Difference  in  the  testimony  of  the  four  Gospels,  di- 
verse and  yet  substantially  the  same — ^Jesus  solves  the  mystery 
of  man  in  his  lowliness  and  exalted  destiny — He  also  solves  the 
mystery  of  the  history  of  Israel,  being  the  fulfillment  of  its  hope, 
or  the  Messiah  that  was  to  come — Moreover,  Jesus  solves  the 
whole  history  of  humanity,  being  its  end  or  goal  and  also  its 
great  central  turning  point — He  is  thus  the  key  to  an  under- 
standing of  man  ;  and  no  less  is  he  the  key  to  a  correct  knowl- 
edge of  God — In  Christ  God  comes  down  to  us  and  becomes  our 
Saviour — He  is  thus  the  God-man,  and  in  him  the  two  lines  of 
Israel's  prophecy  meet — He  is  the  Son  of  God  and  the  Son  of 
man — The  gospel  has  brought  into  the  world  a  new  knowledge 
of  God  and  man,  and  has  thus  caused  a  new  epoch  in  the 
world's  history — Whoever  rejects  Christ  will  soon  lose  a  true 
knowledge  of  both  man  and  God. 


V 

THE  PERSON  OF  JESUS   CHRIST 
:by  cur.  e.  lttth^rdx,  t>,  d., 

PROFESSOB    OF    THEOLOGY    AT     LEIPSIC 

{^^jy^HE  task  has  been  assigned  to  me  of  speaking  to 
//I  \  you  concerning  the  person  of  Jesus  Christ.  This 
V^^jJ^  is  the  highest  theme  and  likewise  the  common 
object  of  sacred  interest  to  universal  Christen- 
dom. For  in  the  name  of  Jesus  Christ  all  in  the  world 
who  call  themselves  Christians  bow,  or  at  least  should 
bow,  their  knees.  As  the  Israelite  distinguished  himself 
from  the  Gentiles  by  his  calling  on  the  name  of  Jehovah, 
so  Christians  distinguish  themselves  fron  non-Christians  by 
their  calling  on  the  name  of  Jesus  Christ.  However  the 
characteristic  feature  of  Christianity  may  be  designated,  how- 
ever the  Christian  tenets  may  be  questioned  or  denied,  this  is 
the  last  and  the  deciding  thing  that  marks  the  Christian,  — 
that  he  bows  the  knee  in  the  name  of  Jesus  Christ.  He  who 
discards  this  may  still  call  himself  a  Christian  ;  we  cannot 
in  truth  recognize  him  as  such.  He  may  be  a  religious 
man,  may  perhaps  be  in  his  way  a  pious  mau,  —  there  have 
been  and  yet  are  pious  heathen  even,  —  but  a  Christian  in  the 

proper  sense  of  the  word  he  is  not.     This  was  the  first 

181 


182  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

confession  of  faith  regarding  the  Risen  One,  the  exclama- 
tion of  the  vanquished  skeptic :  My  Lord  and  my  God ! 
This  was  the  last,  dying  utterance  of  the  first  martyr  of 
the  church,  his  prayer  to  Jesus  Christ :  Lord  Jesus,  receive 
my  spirit !  This  will  be  at  the  end  the  last  prayer  of  the 
martyr  church,  the  petition  to  the  Exalted  One  with  which 
the  Revelation  of  John  closes  :  Come,  Lord  Jesus  !  Between 
the  Acts  of  the  Apostles  and  the  Revelation  of  John,  how- 
ever, Christians  are,  in  the  New  Testament,  described  as 
those  who  call  on  the  name  of  the  Lord  Jesus ;  and  whoso- 
ever shall  call  upon  the  name  of  the  Lord,  it  is  said, 
Rom.  10:  13,  shall  be  saved.  This  is  the  badge  of  the 
Christian. 

It  is  the  common  badge  of  all  Chi'istians.  For  however 
much  the  individual  churches  may  difi'er  from  each  other, 
and  even  though  they  may  be  at  enmity  with  each  other, 
in  the  One  they  are  all  one,  in  their  common  confession  of 
Jesus  Christ  and  in  their  common  calling  upon  his  saving 
name.  As  far  on  earth  as  the  salutation  goes.  Praise  be  to 
Jesus  Christ ;  as  far  as  songs  glorify  him  who  died  on  the 
cross  for  us ;  as  far  as  the  praying  pray  to  him,  and  his 
name  trembles  on  the  lips  of  the  dying,  —  so  far  there  is 
Christian  brotherhood,  so  far  extends  the  Christian  church, 
one,  holy,  universal,  Christian  church ;  but  beyond  these 
limits  it  does  not  go,  for  Christianity  goes  no  fui'ther. 
Calling  upon  the  name  of  Jesus  is  the  common  and  the 
decisive  badge  of  the  Christian. 

Just  this,  however,  is  the  question  at  this  day  in  dis- 
pute ;  for  it  is  the  kernel  of  the  religious  questions  of  the 
daj^  They  may  be  differentlj^  formulized,  —  at  bottom 
the  dispute  is  only  upon  this.  Our  opponents  may  style 
themselves  the  knights  of  freedom  of  faith  and  conscience, 
and  us  the  slaves  of  symbolism  and  the  letter ;  they  may 


THE   PERSON   OF   JESUS   CHRIST  183 

inscribe  upon  their  banners  the  progress  of  science  and 
reconciliation  with  culture,  and  stigmatize  us  as  the  men  of 
retrogression,  consigning  us  to  the  middle  ages  ;  it  may  be 
said  the  point  in  dispute  is  the  question  of  miracles  and 
the  supernatural,  or  how  the  essence  of  Christianity  or  the 
problem  of  the  church  is  to  be  conceived,  or  however 
else  the  religious  opposition  of  the  times  may  be  formu- 
lized ;  the  last  and  deciding  question,  which  underlies  all 
others,  is,  nevertheless,  the  question  concerning  the  person 
of  Jesus  Christ ;  and  the  practical  and  universally  intelligi- 
ble expression  of  this  question  is  the  calling  upon  his 
name. 

I  have  always  been  peculiarly  impressed  with  that  word 
which  the  aged  Simeon,  as  the  Scripture  narrates,  uttered 
over  the  child  Jesus,  as  the  latter  was  brought  into  the 
temple,  calling  him  the  sign  which  should  be  spoken 
against.  For  this  word,  is  it  not,  as  it  were,  the  theme  of 
all  succeeding  history  down  to  our  day,  and  suggested  by 
a  truly  wonderful  glance  at  the  oppositions  which  would 
agitate  times  and  minds  ?  For  about  the  person  of  Jesus 
Christ  minds  have  alwa3's  differed,  and  by  this  to  the  end 
of  days  shall  the  thoughts  of  hearts  be  revealed.  Scarcely, 
however,  for  centuries  has  there  been  a  time  for  which  those 
prophetic  words  of  Simeon  express  so  precisely,  if  I  may 
use  the  term,  the  programme,  as  for  these  times  of  ours. 
This  is  the  mystery  of  his  being  and  the  secret  working 
which  Jesus  exercises,  that  he  makes  a  decision  either  for 
or  against  necessary.  Every  one  must  take  a  definite 
position  towards  him.  He  can  be  abused,  he  can  be  re- 
viled, he  can  perhaps  be  even  hated ;  but  ignored  he  cannot 
be.  He  is  the  ensign  which  God  has  set  up  in  the  midst 
of  the  times,  and  planted  in  the  movement  of  history. 

There  is  something  mysterious  in  his  person   and    his 


184  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

whole  appearance,  which  attracts  us,  and  does  not  let  go 
of  our  thoughts  respecting  him.  And  it  is  not  merely  our 
thoughts,  which  are  incited  by  the  mystery  of  his  being  to 
a  solution  of  the  riddle  which  his  appearance  puts  before 
us ;  it  is  also  our  hearts,  which  are  drawn  towards  him. 
For  his  person  exercises  a  mysterious  influence  upon  all 
nobler  spirits,  who  are  not  wholly  engrossed  in  the  interests 
or  enjoyments  of  ordinary  existence.  Into  the  soul  of  him 
who  has  once  been  met  on  his  ^vay  through  life  by  this 
figure,  it  thrusts  a  thorn,  which  will  allow  him  to  find  no 
rest  until  he  has  found  it  in  Christ  himself,  whom  he  seeks. 
And  even  the  striving  of  the  opponents  against  a  recog- 
nition of  him  is  a  sign  of  this  thorn  which  they  bear  with- 
in them.  Every  mystery  moves  us  to,  and  requires  of  us, 
its  solution.  No  historical  greatness  of  humanity  attains 
to  mysterious  significancy  and  to  power  over  the  minds  and 
hearts  of  men  like  that  attained  by  the  person  of  Jesus 
Christ.  No  one  can  resist  the  inner  necessity  of  becoming 
clear  as  to  this  mystery.  What  shall  be  the  word  that 
solves  this  mysterious  riddle  of  humanity?  What  is  the 
mystery  of  his  person  ?  Of  that  I  am  to-day  to  speak  to 
you. 

You  have  doubtless  heard  of  that  famous  conversation 
which  Napoleon  had,  when  in  Weimar,  in  the  year  1808, 
with  Wieland.  As  the  latter  was  speaking  to  him  of  the 
fulfilled  prophecies  of  Christ  and  his  apostles,  and,  provoked 
by  the  scornful  looks  of  Napoleon,  began  to  wax  warm  on 
the  topic.  Napoleon  interrupted  him  with  the  words,  "  I 
do  not  believe  there  ever  lived  a  Jesus  Christ."  Where- 
upon Wieland,  with  earnest  frankness,  replied,  "Then, 
sire,  in  a  year  from  now,  and  at  least  with  equal  right,  I 
shall  not  believe  there  ever  lived  a  Napoleon."  Then 
Napoleon  changed  the  theme  of  conversation. 


THE   PERSON   OF   JESUS   CHRIST  185 

In  Montholon's  "  Memoirs,"  published  by  Beauterne  in 
1841,  there  are  different  expressions,  reported  as  having 
been  uttered  by  Napoleon,  during  his  last  years,  at  St. 
Helena,  regarding  the  divinity  of  Jesus  Christ.  "  I  know 
men,"  —  about  thus  he  is  represented  as  speaking,  —  "  and 
I  tell  you  that  Jesus  Christ  is  not  a  man.  His  religion  is 
a  mystery,  a  thing  by  itself,  and  proceeds  ftom  an  in- 
telligence which  is  no  human  intelligence.  Alexander, 
Caesar,  Charlemagne,  and  myself  founded  empires  ;  but  on 
what  did  we  rest  the  creations  of  our  genius  ?  Upon  force. 
Jesus  Christ  alone  founded  his  empire  upon  love ;  and  at 
this  hour  millions  of  men  would  die  for  him."  How  far 
these  and  similar  words,  reported  of  him,  from  the  last  part 
of  his  life,  are  historical,  it  would  be  difficult  now  to  de- 
termine. They  have  probably  been  embellished.  Never- 
theless a  kernel  of  truth  undoubtedly  lies  at  their  basis. 
In  any  case  they  affirm  what  must  always,  in  the  end,  be 
said  of  Jesus.  From  that  question  of  the  historical  exist- 
ence of  Jesus  to  this  of  his  divinity  extends  a  —  long  line. 
This  line  describes  the  theme  we  are  to  discuss. 

Jesus  Christ  is  an  historical  fact.  This  is  the  first  point. 
That  Jesus  lived  is  not  a  question ;  that  stands  sure. 
Even  the  heathen  writers  tell  us  he  was  crucified  under 
the  Roman  Emperor  Tiberius.  And  were  they  silent  touch- 
ing him,  the  existence  of  the  Christian  church  would  suffice 
to  attest  him.  He  lived,  he  taught,  he  died ;  and  the  dis- 
ciples, whom  he  gathered  about  him,  have  attested  the  fact 
that  he  rose  from  the  dead.  With  this  testimony  they 
went  out  into  the  world,  and  the  world  has  been  conquered 
by  them.     For  this  testimony  they  yielded  up  their  lives. 

But  what  is  involved  in  this  fact  ?  That  is  the  question. 
Jesus  was  a  teacher,  was  a  founder  of  religion.  This  is 
the  next  point. 


186  THE    BREMEN   LECTURES 

"The  Master,"  "the  Teacher,"  —  so  his  disciples  call 
him,  so  he  is  known  in  the  circle  of  his  friends,  —  this  is 
the  picture  of  him  which  the  Gospels  delineate  for  us. 
What  he  taught  was,  in  substance,  religious.  He  wished 
to  renew  religion  and  the  religious  life ;  this  is  unques- 
tionable. And  the  result  of  his  work  confirms  it.  He 
has  founded  a  new  religion,  and  renewed  the  religious 
thought  and  life  of  humanity.  He  was  a  teacher  and  a 
founder  of  religion.  But  what  kind  of  a  teacher?  What 
kind  of  a  founder  of  religion?    To  this  it  comes. 

Others  have  gathered  disciples  about  them,  disciples  that 
have  been  greatly  attached  to  their  master.  When  Xeno- 
phon  tells  us  of  his  teacher  Socrates,  we  discern,  from  his 
words,  how  his  heart  beat  for  the  dear  teacher.  And  when 
he  speaks  to  us  of  the  yearning,  which  all  who  truly  knew 
him  bore  in  their  hearts  for  the  departed  master,  we  per- 
ceive, in  these  words  of  simplicity  and  plainness,  the  voice 
of  truth.  But  the  disciples  of  Socrates  have  passed  away  ; 
affection  for  the  noble  martyr  has  gradually  gi'own  colder ; 
his  image  in  the  minds  of  men  has  become  more  and  more 
indistinct ;  he  awakens  still  our  interest,  but  who  has  an 
inner  heart-relation  to  him  ?  Socrates  is  a  bright  star  in 
the  firmament  of  humanity ;  but  only  one  star  among 
others ;  not  the  sun  around  whom  the  entire  choir  of  stars 
circles. 

There  have  been,  also,  other  founders  of  religion ;  per- 
sons who  have  not  merely  gathered  disciples  about  them, 
but  have  founded  religious  communities,  in  which  their 
names  live  and  are  worshipped.  No  one,  perhaps,  of  all 
the  founders  of  religion  in  the  heathen  world  is  more  com- 
parable to  Christ  than  that  remarkable  prince  of  India, 
Sakya-Mouni,  who  is  called  Buddha,  whose  worship  still 
unites   many  millions  of  men   in   one   religion.     But,  as 


THE    PERSON   OF   JESUS   CHRIST  187' 

much  as  Buddha's  tenets  seem  to  remind  us  of  Chris- 
tianity, and  as  great  as  is  the  resemblance  of  the  outward 
form  of  the  Buddhistic  religion  to  the  Romish  form  of  the 
Christian  religion,  every  observer  perceives,  at  once,  the 
fundamental  distinction  which  separates  Christianity  from 
Buddhism,  and,  also,  no  less  from  all  other  religions.  No 
religion  but  the  Christian  has  disclosed  the  innermost 
nature  of  God  ;  none  but  this  has  laid  bare,  in  its  peculiar 
centre-point,  the  moral  nature  of  man.  Christianity  alone 
has  taught  that  God  is  holy  love  ;  it  alone  has  uncovered 
the  full  guilt  of  sin.  No  other  religion  knows  of  a  grace 
of  pardon  and  of  a  history  of  this  grace,  and  has  taught 
that  herein  is  to  be  found  the  source  of  moral  life.  None 
condemns  man  so  fully  and  yet  exalts  him  so  high,  shows 
so  much  the  depth  of  his  misery,  and,  at  the  same  time,  the 
height  of  his  calling,  and  opens  the  way  to  attain  it.  No 
other  religion  is,  therefore,  in  the  proper  sense,  one  of 
redemption  and  regeneration.  All  others  go  no  farther 
than  the  surface.  They  have  accomplished  changes  in 
individual  parts  and  sides  of  the  outward  social  life ;  but 
an  actual  renewal  in  the  innermost  foundations  the  gospel 
alone  has  been  able  to  effect.  Hence,  all  other  religions 
have  their  day.  And  when  the  period  of  decline  has 
dawned  upon  them,  they  are  unable  from  their  own 
strength  to  renew  themselves.  Buddhism  undertook  to 
breathe  new  life  into  the  stiffened  Brahmanical  heathenism, 
and  now  spiritual  desolation  and  moral  death  rest  more 
heavily  and  insurmountably  down  upon  it  than  upon  the 
idolatry  of  the  Brahmans.  The  gospel,  on  the  contrary,  is 
an  inexhaustible  fountain.  It  constantly  refreshes  itself 
from  itself,  and  so  sends  forth  a  renewing  moral  energy. 
The  Christian  Church  has  had  times  of  the  deepest  decline, 


188'  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

times  of  the  utmost  degeneracy.    But  from  every  prostra- 
tion it  has  risen  again.     In  it  lives  an  eternal  youth. 

When,  respected  hearers,  we  transport  ourselves  in  spirit 
to  one  of  our  religious  services,  when  the  Christian  assem- 
bly comes  before  our  minds,  as  in  common  with  one  heart  it 
celebrates  the  name  of  Jesus,  in  the  house  where  everything 
about  us  proclaims  his  praise,  and  our  thoughts  wander  from 
there  back  to  the  beginnings  of  the  Christian  community 
and  of  its  religious  service,  and  tarry  at  last  in  that  distant 
land,  upon  which  yet  the  curse  is  so  visibly  imprinted,  and 
with  a  man  of  that  people  which,  from  the  oldest  times  to 
our  day,  despised,  hated,  and  trodden  under  foot  by  all 
other  peoples,  has  roamed  restlessly  over  the  world,  every- 
where resident  and  yet  nowhere  at  home ;  when  we  bring 
this  before  our  minds,  must  it  not  appear  strange  to  us, 
that  we,  the  proud  lords  in  the  realm  of  spirit,  still  in  that 
which  is  the  highest  in  the  spiritual  life,  in  religion,  are 
ruled  by  a  people  with  whom  we  have  in  other  respects  no 
fellowship,  and  by  a  man  who  died  the  most  ignominious 
death  known  to  the  ancient  world,  and  that  his  word  has  be- 
come a  power  which  has  revolutionized  our  entire  thinking 
and  willing?  And  what  is  the  strangest  of  all,  his  own 
people  has  rejected  him,  and  even  yet  knows  no  name  it 
hates  so  much  as  the  name  of  Jesus  of  Nazareth !  Other 
peoples  are  proud  of  their  national  heroes.  The  greatness 
of  Israel,  as  also  its  mission,  was  religion.  All  the  world 
confesses,  that  in  the  province  of  religion  Jesus  is  the 
greatest.  We  bow  before  him,  though  to  us  he  is  a  foreign- 
er, and  his  own  countrymen  despise  him  !  And  as  we  stand 
to  him,  so  do  all  other  nations,  Israel  alone  excepted.  In 
no  other  Jew  do  we  so  easily  forget  the  Jew.  But  who 
thinks  of  that  with  Jesus  of  Nazareth?    He  is  to  us  not 


THE   PERSON   OF   JESUS   CHRIST  189 

the  son  of  Israel,  he  is  to  us  only  the  Saviour.  We  see  in 
him  the  perfect  original  of  humanity,  as  well  as  do  the  in- 
habitants of  Greenland,  or  the  black  negroes  of  Africa, 
or  the  sons  of  the  warm  lands  on  the  Ganges.  Is  this  not 
a  wonderful  fact,  which  must  challenge  our  reflection? 
What  is  the  mysterious  power  of  this  One,  which  binds  the 
hearts  of  all  men  of  all  times  and  places  so  firmly  to  him 
that  they  know  no  higher  love  than  that  which  they  bear  to 
him,  and  for  him  are  ready  to  yield  up  their  lives?  What 
is  the  mystery  of  his  person  ? 

That  Jesus  was  a  man  like  ourselves,  we  all  know. 
That  he  was  no  ordinary  man  all  the  intelligent  admit. 
But  how  high  the  line  which  reaches  from  earth  to  heaven 
must  be  drawn,  —  this  is  the  question.  The  old  rationalists 
placed  him  on  the  grade  of  the  highest  virtue  and  wisdom  ; 
the  later  exalt  him  to  the  height  of  genius ;  one  of  the 
latest  calls  him  a  man  so  great  as  to  touch  the  heavens ; 
the  church  sets  him  on  the  throne  of  God.  So  diflTer- 
ent  is  it  that  men  say  of  him !  What  does  he  say  of 
himself?  For  this  will  always  have  to  be  that  which,  after 
all,  makes  the  final  decision.  For  so  much  confidence  we 
can  in  any  case  give  him,  —  be  we  never  so  distrustful  in 
other  respects,  —  that  he  knew  who  he  was,  and  did  not 
speak  differently  from  what  he  knew.  For  to  hold  him  to 
be  an  enthusiast  who  progressed  through  gloomy  fanaticism 
to  imposture,  this  we  will  leave  to  romance  writers  like 
Renan ;  and  to  ascribe  to  him  arrogant  self-exaltation, 
which  would  have  reached  the  bounds  of  insanity,  this  was 
reserved  for  a  David  Strauss. 

Do  we,  however,  wish  to  know  what  Jesus  said  of  him- 
self, then  we  must  consult  the  writings  of  the  Evangelists. 
For  these  are  the  only  source  of  that  information.  But 
whether  they  are  also  a  reliable  source  ?    This  is  doubted. 


190  THE   BREMEN    LECTURES 

It  is  not  the  place  here  closely  to  discuss  the  matter.  This 
one  thing  can  suflSce  for  us.  The  Gospels  are  not  literary 
productions  of  individuals,  who  have  deposited  therein 
their  particular  thoughts  and  discoveries,  but  the  common 
consciousness  of  the  Christian  community  has  found  ex- 
pression in  them.  Concerning  many  questions,  doubts  and 
controversies  obtained  in  the  oldest  church ;  never  any 
doubt  obtained  respecting  the  reliableness  of  what  the  Gos- 
pels report  of  Jesus  Christ.  And  yet  there  could  not  have 
failed  to  be  doubt,  had  there  been  opportunity  for  any,  be- 
cause what  Jesus  said  and  did  took  place  not  in  a  corner, 
but  had  many  witnesses.  This  consideration  alone  can 
suffice  to  assure  us  that  we  have  here  a  trustworthy  report 
of  Jesus.  And  did  we  wish  to  reject  never  so  much  in  the 
particulars,  the  principal  thing  would  still  remain,  the 
essence  of  his  wonderful  works,  the  kernel  of  his  words 
and  of  his  testimonies  regarding  himself,  and  that  is 
enough. 

But  do  they  not  contradict  each  other  ? 

Certainly,  one  can  say,  there  is  a  difference  between  the 
first  three  and  the  fourth  Gospel.  This  difference  has  at 
all  times  been  remarked.  Even  the  old  church  busied  itself 
therewith.  In  what  does  it  consist?  From  antiquity  down 
it  has  been  thus  described :  the  first  three  present  more 
prominently  the  human  side  of  Jesus,  the  fourth  renders  his 
divine  side  more  prominent ;  those  draw  the  line  from  earth 
up  to  heaven,  this  draws  the  line  from  above  down  to 
earth;  the  former  portray  his  relation  to  the  world,  the 
latter  his  relation  to  God ;  the  former  describe  the  Son 
of  man  (God),  the  latter,  the  Son  of  God.  This  differ- 
ence is  unquestionable. 

Indeed,  the  first  three  Gospels  differ  among  themselves. 
Matthew  writes  for  Christians  from   the  Jews,  Luke  for 


THE    PERSON   OF   JESUS   CHRIST  191 

Christians  from  the  Gentiles.  The  former  portrays  him, 
therefore,  as  the  hope  of  Israel,  the  latter  as  the  object  of 
the  yearning  of  all  nations.  The  former  traces  back  his 
lineage  to  David  and  Abraham,  the  latter  to  Adam  ;  the 
former  portraj^s  his  birth  in  the  house  of  David  at  the  time 
of  King  Herod,  the  latter  his  birth  by  operation  of  the 
Spirit  of  God  at  the  time  of  Caesar  Augustus.  The  former 
shows  us  how  in  Jesus  the  history  of  Israel,  the  latter  how 
in  him  the  history  of  the  world,  has  found  its  end ;  the 
former  how  Jesus  is  the  higher  completion  of  the  old  time 
of  the  law  and  prophecy,  the  latter  how  he  is  the  begin- 
ning of  the  new  time  of  the  Holy  Spirit.  Mark,  however, 
delineates  for  the  first  stage  of  the  instruction  of  Gentile 
Christians,  in  vivid  colors,  a  picture  of  the  victorious  power 
of  God  over  even  the  spirits  of  the  deep,  as  it  was  mani- 
fested in  the  person  and  works  of  Jesus,  and  consumed  in 
indefatigable  service  on  behalf  of  men.  But  as  much  as 
these  Gospels  and  the  pictures  of  Christ  which  they  respect- 
ively give  us  differ  from  each  other,  over  against  the  Gos- 
pel of  John  they  form,  nevertheless,  a  class  whose  internal 
difference  recedes  before  their  unity,  when  compared  to  the 
difference  b}^  which  they  are  separated  from  the  Johan- 
nine  Gospel.  For  if  Matthew  goes  back  to  Abraham, 
Luke  to  Adam,  John  goes  back  to  God  and  the  eternal 
being  with  God.  From  the  eternal  bosom  of  the  Father 
he  represents  the  Son  as  proceeding,  and  to  the  eternal 
world  of  God  he  connects  the  threads  of  the  history  which 
took  place  on  earth  and  in  time.  And  everywhere  with 
him,  through  the  lowliness  of  human  existence,  shines  the 
eternal  Godhead,  who  in  the  flesh  has  made  his  abode  with 
men. 

Are  these  opposites,  which  exclude  each  other,  or  only 
different  sides  of  the  same  thing,  which  mutally  require 


192  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

each  other?    And  if  the  two  belong  together,  how  are  we 
to  conceive  of  this  ? 

There  is,  on  the  part  of  the  first  evangelists,  a  saying  of 
Jesus  which  forms,  as  it  were,  the  iron  fastening  which 
binds  their  representation  of  Jesus  inseparably  to  that  of 
John.  It  is  that  great  saying  whose  Johannean  cast  has 
at  all  times  been  observed  and  recognized,  and  which,, 
besides  the  wonderful  depth  of  its  content,  is  of  so  pecu-* 
liarly  marked  and  complete  a  form  that  no  one  can  doubt 
its  having  come  from  the  mouth  of  Jesus.  It  is  that 
saying  in  Matt.  11 :  27,  —  "  All  things  are  delivered  unto  me 
of  my  Father  ;  and  no  man  knoweth  the  Son,  but  the  Father ; 
neither  knoweth  any  man  the  Father,  save  the  Son,  and  he 
to  whomsoever  the  Son  will  reveal  him." 

I  said,  the  first  evangelists  represent  Jesus'  relation  to 
the  world,  John  his  relation  to  God.  The  two  are  here 
united.  ''  All  things  are  delivered  unto  me  of  my  Father," 
—  this  describes  him  as  the  Lord  of  the  world.  But  this  his 
unconditioned  relation  to  the  world  rests  upon  his  abso- 
lutely unlimited  relation  to  God.  He  is  the  Lord  of  the 
world,  because  he  is  the  Son  of  God  ;  he  is  the  former  in  the 
unconditioned  sense,  because  he  is  the  latter  in  the  uncon- 
ditioned sense.  His  unconditioned  divine  sonship  is  the 
necessary  presupposition  of  his  all-embracing  rule  of  the 
world,  and,  in  turn,  his  all-embracing  rule  of  the  world  is 
the  natural  consequence  of  his  unconditioned  divine  son- 
ship  ;  that  is,  he  is  what  the  first  evangelists  portray  him, 
only  because  he  is  also  what  John  announces  him  to  be. 
It  is  as  with  a  great  painting.  What  those  portray  of 
Christ  forms  the  foreground  of  the  same,  the  part  which 
first  catches  the  attention ;  what  John  announces  of  him 
forms  the  more  removed  portion,  or  background, —  a  back- 
ground which  stretches  away  into  the  concealed  depths  of 


THE    PERSON    OF   JESUS    CHRIST  193 

heaven  and  into  the  endlessness  of  eternity.  The  two 
sides  belong  together  ;  the  one  is  correct  as  representative 
of  Jesus,  only  because  the  other  is  also. 

"  No  man  knoweth  the  Son,  but  the  Father ;  neither 
knoweth  any  man  the  Father,  save  the  Son,  and  he  to  whom- 
soever the  Son  will  reveal  him."  By  this  Jesus  describes 
himself  as  a  mystery.  He  includes  himself  in  the  divine 
mystery.  As  God  is  a  mj^stery,  so  is  he.  For  he  belongs 
with  God.  It  is  true,  he  and  the  Father  are  known  and 
open  to  each  other.  But  to  the  world  he  is  a  mystery  as 
undisclosed  as  God  is  himself.  But  he  wishes  to  be  known. 
For  to  that  end  he  has  revealed  himself.  And  the  knowl- 
edge of  him  discloses  the  mystery  of  man  and  the  mys- 
tery of  God.  The  mystery  of  man  he  discloses,  so  far  as 
he  is  the  Son  of  man  ;  the  mystery  of  God,  so  far  as  he  is 
the  Son  of  God. 

Man  is  a  myster3^  For  the  contradiction  which  he 
bears  in  himself  is  a  riddle.  From  of  old  this  enigma 
busied  man.  Its  profound  expression  is  given  in  the  eighth 
Psalm:  "Out  of  the  mouths  of  babes  and  sucklings  hast 
thou  ordained  strength  because  of  thine  enemies,  that  thou 
mightest  still  the  enemy  and  the  avenger.  When  I 
consider  thy  heavens,  the  work  of  thy  fingers,  the  moon 
and  the  stars  which  thou  hast  ordained,  what  is  man,  that 
thou  art  mindful  of  him  ?  and  the  son  of  man,  that  thou  visit- 
esfc  him  ?  For  thou  hast  made  him  to  be  but  little  lower  than 
God,i  and  hast  crowned  him  with  glory  and  honor.  Thou 
madest  him  to  have  dominion  over  the  works  of  thy  hands ; 
thou  hast  put  all  things  under  his  feet:  all  sheep  and 
oxen,  yea,  and  the  beast  of  the  field ;  the  fowl  of  the  air, 

1  So   tne  lecturer,   "  Du  hast  ihn  nur  wenig  lassen   unter  Gott  eein."    The 
Hebrew,  D' IT'S J^O  tO|*?3  "^HIDnrVI,  Gesenius  (Robinson's)  translates  ^Aou  hast 

caused  him  to  lack  but  little  of  a  God.  —  Tr 

N 


194  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

and  the  fish  of  the  sea,  and  whatsoever  passeth  through 
the  paths  of  the  seas.  O  Lord,  our  Lord,  how  excellent  is 
thy  name  in  all  the  earth ! " 

It  is  the  contradiction  which  in  man  is  reconciled,  be- 
tween lowliness  and  loftiness,  between  the  lowliness  of  his 
natural  condition  and  the  loftiness  of  his  destiny,  between 
the  feebleness  of  his  present  and  the  glory  of  his  future,  — 
this  strange  riddle  of  the  human  existence,  which  awaits 
its  solution,  is  that  which  this  profound  Psalm  celebrates. 
But  Jesus  is  the  end  of  the  human  race  and  of  its  history ; 
he  is  the  Son  of  man  absolutely.  He  is  thus  the  solution 
of  the  mystery  which  man  is. 

Every  lower  grade  of  being  receives  its  light  from  the 
higher.  Nature  becomes  intelligible  to  us  only  when  we 
place  it  in  the  light  of  human  destiny.  Then  we  perceive, 
that  it  exists  not  for  itself,  that  it  is  a  preparation  for  man, 
that  it  is  something  on  the  way  to  him,  that  it  points  be- 
yond itself,  that  its  existence  means  man,  that  it  has  been 
advancing  towards  man,  that  it  is  as  it  were  a  gradual  be- 
coming of  man  himself.  In  itself  it  is  incomplete,  forms 
no  unity  in  itself,  is  not  a  whole  by  itself;  not  till  man 
has  come  does  it  find  its  aim,  attain  its  destiny.  Only  in 
connection  with  him,  therefore,  can  it  be  understood ; 
considered  by  itself  alone  it  is  full  of  mystery  and  con- 
tradiction. The  knowledge  of  man  is  the  solution  of  the 
riddle  which  nature  is. 

Man,  himself,  however,  in  turn,  is  equally  a  riddle  and 
full  of  contradictions.  For  in  himself,  it  is  true,  he  is  the 
harmony  of  the  world,  but  through  sin  he  has  fallen  into 
contradiction  with  himself  and  with  the  world ;  because  he 
has  fallen  into  contradiction  with  God,  in  whom  alone  he 
holds  his  unity.  Thus  that  deep  schism  has  come  into  him 
which  has  made  of  himself  and  of  his  life  a  life  of  the 


THE   PERSON   OF  JESUS   CHRIST  195 

sharpest  oppositions  and  contradictions.  We  cannot  un- 
derstand this  contradictory  existence  of  man,  except  we 
find  its  solution  in  Him  in  whom  sinful  humanity  attains 
its  end,  and  the  history  of  the  same  its  destiny ;  that  is, 
in  the  Son  of  man.  A  similar  position  to  that  occupied  by 
man  with  respect  to  nature  is  occupied  by  the  Son  of  man 
respecting  humanity  become  sinful.  As  the  former  is  the 
end  of  nature,  and  hence  the  light  by  which  it  is  under- 
stood, so  the  latter  is  the  end  of  humanity,  and  hence  the 
light  by  which  it  may  be  understood.  As  man  is  the  son 
of  nature,  but  its  higher  son,  and,  therefore,  its  lord,  so 
Jesus  is  the  Son  of  humanity,  but  its  higher  Son,  and, 
therefore,  its  Lord.  Man  unites  the  preceding  grades  of 
being  in  himself,  but  he  exalts  them  to  a  higher  sphere. 
vSo  Jesus  sums  up  entire  humanity  in  himself,  and  exalts 
it  to  a  higher  grade.  He  is,  as  a  profound  old  church 
father  has  called  him,  the  recapitulation  of  the  human 
race  and  of  its  historical  unfolding. 

Therefore,  Jesus  loves  to  call  himself  the  Son  of  man. 

What  is  implied  in  this  name  ? 

The  apostle  says,  "  When  the  fulness  of  the  time  was 
come,  God  sent  forth  his  Son."  Did  Christ  come  in  the 
fulness  of  the  times,  then  he  appeared  as  the  end  of  the 
times  and  of  their  history,  —  as  the  end  of  the  history  of 
Israel,  as  the  end  of  the  history  of  humanity.  The  former 
is  implied  in  the  name  Christ  which  he  bears  ;  the  latter  in 
the  name  Son  of  man.  The  former,  Matthew  renders  par- 
ticularly prominent ;  the  latter,  Luke. 

Jesus  is  the  Christ,  the  Messiah,  i.  e.,  the  fulfilment  of 
the  hope  of  Israel.  In  him  the  prophecy  of  Israel  was 
fulfilled,  in  him  the  entire  history  of  Israel  was  fulfilled. 
For  not  merely  single  words  of  the  Old  Testament  Scrip- 
tures are  prophetic,  but  the  whole  history  of  Israel,  as  it  is 


196  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

deposited  in  the  Sacred  Scriptures  of  the  Old  Testament, 
is  prophetic.  For  every  stage  of  the  same  points  beyond 
itself  to  a  future,  in  which  it  is  to  find  its  completing  truth  ; 
as  well  the  priestly  time  of  Israel,  which  began  with  Moses 
and  Aaron,  as  the  regal,  which  attained  its  typical  cul- 
mination in  David  and  Solomon,  and  the  prophetic,  whose 
blossoming  period  coincided  with  the  fall  of  Israel.  And 
as  the  times  of  Israel  are  prophetic,  so  their  bearers,  all 
the  servants  of  God  under  the  old  covenant,  from  Moses, 
the  covenant-mediator,  down  to  the  prophets,  who  were 
rewarded  for  their  service  with  persecution ;  and  as  the 
bearers  of  the  history,  so  no  less  the  regulations  of  the 
law.  They  are  all,  as  the  apostle  calls  them,  a  shadow  of 
good  things  to  come;  their  reality,  however,  is  Christ. 
And,  lastly,  as  the  law  is  prophetic,  so,  too,  all  the  word 
of  the  prophets  from  beginning  to  end.  This  is  the  truth 
of  the  Old  Testament,  that  its  present  includes  a  future, 
in  which  it  is  to  attain  its  consummation,  in  which  its  in- 
folded substance  is  to  be  unfolded  to  full  bloom. 

Jesus  is  the  Christ,  i.  e.,  the  fulfilment  of  the  history 
and  of  the  hope  of  Israel.  Hence,  he  says  to  his  disciples, 
"Blessed  are  your  eyes,  for  they  see;  and  your  ears,  for 
they  hear.  For  verily  I  say  unto  you,  that  many  prophets 
and  righteous  men  have  desired  to  see  those  things  which 
ye  see,  and  have  not  seen  them  ;  and  to  hear  those  things 
which  ye  hear,  and  have  not  heard  them."  (Matt.  13 : 
16,  17.)  He  is  the  object  of  the  yearning  of  the  old  time. 
Therefore,  he  is  the  Lord  of  the  church,  the  Bridegroom  of 
Jehovah's  bride,  and  the  greatest  of  the  Old  Testament 
prophets.  John  the  Baptist's  mission  it  was  to  be  brides- 
man. He  led  the  bride  to  the  bridegroom,  to  be  united  to 
him  in  marriage,  to  be  made  one  with  him.     This  is  the 


THE    PERSON    OF   JESUS    CHRIST  197 

end  of  the  history  of  Israel.  Jesus  Christ  is  the  end  of 
that  history.     For  he  is  the  Messiah. 

But  if  in  him  the  infolded  substance  of  Israel  is  unfolded 
to  full  bloom,  this  happens  not  for  Israel  alone,  but  for  all 
the  world.  For  from  the  beginning,  even  from  the  days  of 
Abraham,  the  salvation  which  is  deposited  in  Israel,  and 
here  has  its  history  that  attains  its  end  in  Jesus,  is 
destined  to  become  the  salvation  of  the  world.  In  Abra- 
ham's seed  shall  all  the  nations  of  the  earth  be  blessed. 
This  destiny  fulfils  itself  in  Jesus.  His  position  respects 
not  merely  Israel,  but  the  world  ;  he  is  not  merely  the  end 
of  Israel,  but  that  of  humanity ;  he  is  not  merely  the  Son 
of  David,  but  the  Son  of  man. 

He  is  David's  Son  and  David's  Lord ;  he  is  more  than 
the  prophets,  he  is  more  than  the  temple,  he  is  the  Lord  of 
the  congregation  and  a  Lord  of  the  Sabbath.  But  he  is  all 
this,  not  without  being  also  the  other  :  the  Son  of  man,  the 
Lord  of  the  world,  the  object  of  the  yearning  of  every 
human  soul. 

When  he  calls  the  world  the  field  on  which  the  seed  of 
his  word  is  to  be  sown  ;  when  he  says  of  himself,  that  all 
things  are  delivered  unto  him  b}^  his  Father ;  when  he  as- 
cribes to  himself  all  power  in  heaven  and  on  earth,  even 
the  power  to  forgive  sins  ;  when  he  characterizes  himself  as 
the  future  Judge  of  all  men,  before  whose  tribunal  all  na- 
tions are  to  appear  and  receive  from  his  mouth  the  sentence 
which  decides  as  to  their  eternal  state,  —  in  all  this  he 
designates  himself  not  merely  as  the  Lord  of  Israel,  but  as 
the  Lord  of  the  world.  He  is  the  Lord  of  the  world, 
because  in  him  humanity  has  attained  the  end  of  its 
history  and  of  its  destiny.  For  this  is  the  position  of 
man  as  the  eighth  Psalm  marks  it :  all  things  are  put 
under  his   feet.     But  this  destiny  has   not   been   realized 


198  THE    BREMEN   LECTURES 

in  man.  The  world  has  not  become  subject  to  man,  but 
man  has  become  subject  to  the  world.  For  he  has  become 
subject  to  sin,  and  so  to  death.  In  this  way  he  has  not 
gained,  but  lost  his  rule  over  the  world.  Then  Daniel 
announces  a  future,  —  after  the  time  of  the  power  and  rule 
of  sinful  men,  which  he  designated  by  the  figures  of  the  four 
beasts  that  come  up  successively  from  the  troubled  sea  of 
national  life  in  the  four  great  kingdoms  of  the  world,  —  a 
time  of  the  God-given  rule  of  the  Son  of  man,  to  whom  the 
Ancient  of  days  commits  all  dominion  and  power  and  the 
greatness  of  the  kingdom  under  the  whole  heaven  (Dan. 
7).  Then  the  destiny  of  man  is  to  be  fulfilled  in  the  Son 
of  man.  In  Jesus,  the  Son  of  man,  it  has  been  fulfilled, 
but,  as  the  Epistle  to  the  Hebrews  (chap.  1)  teaches,  after 
we  had  fallen  into  sin  and  death,  in  the  wa}^  of  humiliation 
and  of  death,  on  account  of  man's  sin.  Jesus  is  the  goal 
for  which  humanity  and  its  history  were  destined.  He  stands 
in  the  middle  of  the  times.  All  the  previous  history  of  the 
nations  tends  towards  him.  In  him  centre  the  manifold 
wa3'S  of  national  history.  In  him  the  old  time  comes  to  an 
end,  and  a  new  begins.  He  is  the  great  turning-point  of 
the  times.  This  is  the  loftiest  view  of  history,  one 
which  has  inspired  our  greatest  historians,  and  has  made 
out  of  a  John  Miiller  a  believing  Christian.  From  Jesus 
as  the  point  of  vision  wt;  understand  the  course  of  the 
world,  —  from  him  alone.  From  him  we  also  understand 
ourselves. 

For  he  is  not  merely  the  end  of  our  race  as  a  whole,  he 
is  also  the  end  of  every  individual  soul.  For  him  the  soul 
is  designed  ;  in  him  alone  it  finds  what  it  wishes  and  seeks, 
often  without  knowing  what  it  purposes ;  in  him  it  reaches 
its  destination,  in  him  it  comes  to  its  truth.  For  he  is  the 
concealed  law  of  our  being.     As  long  as  it  is  yet  on  the 


THE    PERSON    OF   JESUS   CHRIST  199 

way  seeking,  it  is  full  of  unrest.  He  is  its  rest,  its  peace. 
"  Come  unto  me,  all  ye  that  labor  and  are  heavy  laden,  and 
I  will  give  you  rest."  He  is  our  end.  We  understand  our- 
selves only  in  him.  What  we  wish  and  purpose,  what  we 
ought  and  seek,  is  to  ourselves  unknown  ;  our  entire  being 
is  to  us  full  of  riddles,  our  entire  existence  full  of  contra- 
dictions. But  the  riddles  all  and  the  contradictions  of  our 
being  and  life  resolve  themselves  in  him.  In  him  we  under- 
stand ourselves.  The  mystery  of  Jesus  Christ  is  the  key  to 
the  understanding  of  man. 

Let  us  sum  up  what  has  thus  far  been  said.  The  history 
of  Israel  is  a  riddle,  until  we  place  it  in  the  light  of  the 
knowledge  of  Jesus  Christ ;  then  it  becomes  clear  to  us. 
Humanity  and  its  history  is  a  riddle,  until  we  see  the  end 
of  their  ways  in  Jesus  Christ ;  then  they  become  intelligible 
to  us.  We  ourselves,  our  being  and  life,  are  a  riddle,  until 
we  find  Jesus  Christ ;  then  we  understand  ourselves  and 
what  we  ought  and  wish.  The  mystery  of  Jesus  Christ  is 
the  key  to  the  understanding  of  man.  This  is  one  part ; 
the  other  is,  that  it  is  no  less  the  key  to  the  knowledge  of 
God.     For  he  is  the  Son  of  God. 

In  Jesus  to  behold  the  Son  of  man,  the  original  of 
humanity,  in  which  our  race  unfolds  itself  to  its  fullest 
and  most  beautiful  bloom,  —  this  is,  in  modern  theology, 
the  reigning  view,  as  particularly  Schleiermacher  gave 
it  form  and  currency.  It  makes  an  important  step  beyond 
the  old  rationalistic  notion  of  the  ideal  of  virtue,  and  has 
in  itself  something  which  can  give  not  merely  to  the  under- 
standing, but  also  to  the  deeper  need  of  the  soul,  a  higher 
degree  of  satisfaction.  But  the  whole  truth  it  is  not.  It 
might,  perhaps,  be  correct  if  there  were  no  sin.  For, 
according  to  this  view,  Christ  is  only  the  highest  unfolding 
of  that  which  fi-om  the  beoinning  was  desiofned  and  de- 


200  TUB    BREMEN    LECTURES 

posited  in  human  nature ;  he  has  proceeded  only  from  tlie 
deepest  life-sources  which  we  have  within  us.  In  him  the 
world  of  creation  has  found,  in  the  way  of  its  self-unfold- 
ing, its  end.  But  we  need  more  than  that.  Since  sin  has 
entered  into  the  world  of  creation,  we  have  need  not 
merely  of  a  complete  ideal  of  the  world  of  creation,  but, 
above  all,  of  an  atonement  for  our  sin,  of  a  mediator  of 
redemption,  of  a  revelation  of  the  grace  of  God. 

The  Son  of  man  is  the  exaltation  of  man  to  nearness 
with  God.  "Thou  hast  made  him  to  be  but  little  lower 
than  God,i  and  hast  crowned  him  with  glory  and  honor,"  it 
is  said  in  the  eighth  Psalm.  This  is  the  end  of  creation,  — 
a  man  so  great  as  to  touch  the  heavens,  as  Jesus  has  been 
called.  But  it  is  not  merely  needful  that  we  mount  up  to 
God ;  it  is  especially  needful  that  God  come  down  to  us. 
It  is  not  enough  that  we  open  ourselves  towards  him ;  the 
main  thing  is,  that  he  open  himself  in  grace  towards  us, 
and  impart  himself  to  us.  The  old  heathen  world  knew  of 
godlike  men,  men  who  ascend  to  Olympus.  The  moral 
philosophy  of  the  ancient  world  is  the  exaltation  of  the 
human  to  the  divine.  The  highest  virtue  of  its  noblest 
representatives  is  love,  which  soars  above  the  earthly  to 
the  world  of  eternal  ideals.  Christ,  as  merely  the  Son  of 
man,  is  the  ideal  of  these  thoughts  of  the  heathen  world. 
But  the  gospel  preaches  not  merely  a  love  of  exaltation  to 
God,  but  especially  a  love  of  the  condescension  of  God  to 
us.  And  this  has  saved  the  world.  Even  the  noblest 
idealism  of  the  Platonic  school  had  at  last  to  confess  its 
impotency,  and  the  heathen  philosophy  closes  in  one  of  its 
final  representatives  with  the  acknowledgment,  that  in  this 
way  the  end  is  not  to  be  found:  "Man  cannot  approach 
unto  the  gods,  the  gods  must  come  to  men."     The  first 

»  Sec  note  uuder  p.  125. 


THE    PERSON    OF   JESUS   CHRIST  201 

hymns  of  praise,  however,  at  the  threshold  of  the  New 
Testament,  exult,  "  He  hath  visited  and  redeemed  his 
people."     This  was  the  fulfilment  of  the  old  prophecy. 

Through  the  prophecy  of  Israel  run  two  lines.  One 
makes  a  bridge  from  inan  up  to  God,  the  other  from  God 
down  to  man.  The  former  shows  us  a  man  full  of  the 
spirit  of  God,  a  man  standing  in  the  service  of  God,  a  man 
advanced  near  to  God  and  furnished  with  his  gifts  and 
powers.  The  end  of  this  line  is  the  Messiah  and  the  Son 
of  man.  But  by  the  side  of  this  runs  another,  which  an- 
nounces the  future  revelation  of  Jehovah,  his  gracious  pres- 
ence with  his  people,  his  reigning  as  King  over  the  nations. 
Man  is  to  approach  unto  God,  and  God  wills  to  come  to 
men.  The  two  lines  meet  in  Jesus.  In  the  Old  Testament 
they  proceed  near  each  other ;  they  approximate,  but  as  yet 
do  not  unite  with  each  other.  A  man  who  is  the  appear- 
ance of  God  himself,  a  revelation  of  God,  who  is  God  be- 
come man,  —  this  thought  was  far  off  from  the  whole 
ancient  world,  was  far  off  even  from  the  Old  Testa- 
ment. For  it  is  a  wondrous  thought,  one  which  the  hu- 
man mind  has  not  the  courage  to  think  of  itself.  Hea- 
thendom obliterated  the  boundaries  between  God  and  man, 
Israel  kept  the  two  sharply  apart.  The  God-man,  there- 
fore, in  the  proper  and  full  sense,  neither  the  one  nor  the 
other  find.  Still,  in  the  last  of  the  prophets,  in  Malachi, 
the  two  stand  near  each  other :  the  Lord  who  comes  to  his 
temple,  and  his  messenger  of  the  covenant.  The  times 
before  Christ  do  not  know  the  idea  of  the  God-man,  be- 
cause they  know  not  the  fact  of  the  same.  For  the  idea 
did  not  produce  the  fact,  but  the  fact  produced  the  idea. 
First  the  God-man  came,  then  men  dared  to  think  him. 
Jesus  Christ  is  the  point  in  which  the  two  lines  come 
together.     He  is  the  man  who  is  God ;  he  is  God  who  is 


202  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

man.  Here  is  more  than  the  ideal  of  humanity,  here  is  the 
revelation  and  presence  of  God  himself ;  he  is  not  merely 
the  Son  of  man,  he  is  the  Son  of  God ;  in  him  not  merely 
the  bosom  of  humanity  has  disclosed  itself,  in  him  is  dis- 
closed the  eternal  bosom  of  the  Godhead.  God  was  in 
Christ,  —  this  is  the  theme  of  John's  Gospel.  Again  and 
again  this  thought  returns,  and  in  a  multitude  of  forms. 
He  is  the  Word,  i.  e.,  the  absolute  revelation  of  God ;  he 
is  the  Life,  i.  e.,  the  disclosed  content  of  God;  he  is  the 
Light,  i.  e.,  the  appearance  of  the  holiness  and  truth  of 
God;  he  is  the  Way,  i.  e.,  the  mediation  to  fellowship 
with  God,  for  he  is  the  presence  of  God  himself:  "He 
that  hath  seen  him  hath  seen  the  Father."  This  is  what 
the  Gospel  of  John  understands  by  the  Son  of  God.  Be- 
tween him  and  the  Father  there  is  no  barrier,  either  of 
sinfulness  or  of  finiteness :  He  is  the  Holy  One  and  the 
One  unconditionally  in  unity  with  the  Father,  —  Eternity 
in  time.  Divinity  in  actual  humanity.  For  the  divine  which 
we  believe  and  confess  to  be  in  Christ  does  not  hover  above 
him  as  perchance  an  idea,  but  is  realized  in  him  as  a  fact, 
and  hence  is  to  be  found  only  in  his  human  reality,  in  him, 
the  One  become  flesh.  It  is  true,  he  has  resigned  his  world- 
position  of  power  for  the  position  of  a  servant  in  feeble 
flesh,  —  into  this  glory  he  first  recedes  with  his  exaltation. 
But  the  completeness  of  the  Divine  nature  and  life,  full  of 
gi-ace  and  truth,  —  this  glory  of  holy  love  he  bore  con- 
stantly with  him,  and  this  shone  forth  in  his  every  word  and 
act.  In  the  latter  the  former  was  brought  low  and  lifted 
up.  For  a  twofold  position  God  has  to  the  world :  he  is 
power  and  he  is  love.  But  the  power  serves  the  love  and 
determines  and  limits  itself  by  the  love.  In  Jesus  Christ 
the  Eternal  Love,  when  it  descended  into  the  societ}'  of 
fallen   men,  enclosed   its   power  within   the  limits   of  an 


THE   PERSON   OF  JESUS   CHRIST  203 

earthly  human  existence,  to  pass,  after  having  accomplished 
the  work  of  redemption,  up  from  lowliness  to  loftiness,  and 
out  from  narrowness  to  the  breadth  of  world-embracing 
power  and  efficiency.  This  is  what  the  Scripture  teaches 
us  of  Jesus  Christ,  the  Son  of  God,  and  of  the  history  of 
his  divine  Sonship. 

Son  of  man,  Son  of  God,  —  these  are  the  two  sides  of  the 
being  of  Jesus  Christ,  the  exaltation  of  humanity  to  God, 
the  condescension  of  God  to  us.  That  mysterious  saying  of 
Matt.  11 :  "  All  things  are  delivered  unto  me  of  my  Father, 
and  no  man  knoweth  the  Son  but  the  Father,  neither 
knoweth  any  man  the  Father  save  the  Son  and  he  to  whom- 
soever the  Son  will  reveal  him,"  —  this  saying  joins  the 
two  sides  together  in  unity. 

Jesus  represents  himself  here  as  a  mystery,  but  as  a  mys- 
tery revealed.  Confessedly  ^  great  is  the  m^^stery  of  god- 
liness :  God  manifest  in  the  flesh.  This  mystery  discloses 
the  understanding  of  man  and  the  understanding  of  God. 
For  the  deepest  thing  in  man,  and  his  peculiar  nature,  is 
that  he  is  destined  for  God.  Whatever  else  we  may  say  of 
man,  it  all  does  not  concern  the  centre  of  his  being,  unless 
we  understand  him  in  his  destination  and  in  his  susceptibility 
for  God.  And  the  deepest  and  innermost  thing  that  we  can 
say  of  God  is,  that  he  is  holy  love,  which  wishes  man.  For 
higher  than  his  power  and  wisdom  goes  God's  love.  To 
understand  God  rightly  is  not  to  understand  him  as  the 
Infinite  Spirit,  as  the  Power  of  all  things,  as  the  Source 
of  all  life,  but  as  eternal  self-imparting  Love.  This  is  the 
highest  and  best  thing  that  we  can  say  of  God.  And  this 
knowledge  of  God  is  the  knowledge  of  the  gospel  of  Jesus 
Christ.     The  gospel  has  taught  us  to  understand  not  merely 

I'OfioAovow/xeVws,!  Tim.  3: 16,  is  rendered  in  the  German  of  the  lecture  (as  iv 
Luther's  version)  by  kiindlich,  known,  adv.  manifestly.  —  Tr. 


204  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

man,  but  it  has  taught  us  to  understand  also  God,  in  the 
God-man  Jesus  Christ. 

Every  higher  stage  in  the  history  of  humanity  is  an 
Advance  in  man's  knowledge  of  both  himself  and  God.  All 
true  advances  of  the  human  spirit,  also  all  progressions  of 
culture,  are  thereby  conditioned.  Whatever  does  not  further 
us  in  this  knowledge,  while  it  may  beautify  our  earthly 
life,  enlarge  our  knowledge  of  the  world,  exalt  our  position 
in  the  world,  is  not  for  man  a  true  gain.  The  gospel  has 
brought  a  new  epoch  into  the  history  of  our  race,  and  has 
caused  an  amazing  advance  in  the  entire  spiritual  life  of 
humanity.  It  could  not  have  attained  to  this  significancy 
and  have  produced  this  effect,  if  it  had  not  brought  a  new 
knowledge  of  God  and  of  man,  a  knowledge  unknown  to 
the  ancient  world.  That  man  is  a  rational  being,  this  the 
Greeks  and  Romans  knew.  But  that  his  soul  was  created 
in  the  image  of  God  and  longs  for  God,  that  its  hunger  and 
thirst  are  appeased  only  when  God  graciously  unites  him- 
self in  personal  love-association  with  it,  —  this  the  world 
learned  first  through  Christianity.  And  whatever  advances 
in  the  humanities  we  have  since  made,  the  starting-point 
of  all  is  this  Christian  knowledge  of  man,  of  his  being  and 
destiny.  Farther,  that  higher  powers  rule  in  the  world, 
that  a  Supreme  Spirit  hovers  over  all ;  of  this  also  the 
heathen  world  had  a  dim  apprehension.  But  that  above 
the  stars  is  enthroned  a  God  whose  heart  is  moved  towards 
us  men  with  love,  and  who  seeks  his  happiness  in  our 
happiness ;  who  forgives  sin  and  pities  the  sinner,  and,  to 
save  us  from  a  lost  condition,  hesitates  not  to  sink  himself 
into  our  flesh,  thus  to  impart  himself  fully  and  wholly  to 
us,  and  to  teach  us  what  love  signifies,  —  this  not  even  the 
thought-flight  of  a  Plato  approached,  and  the  science  of  an 
Aristotle  would  have   considered   it   foolishness.     To   us, 


THE    PERSON   OF   JESUS   CHRIST  205 

however,  this  knowledge  of  God  has  become  a  fountain 
of  comfort  and  of  wisdom.  By  this  knowledge  we  now 
live  ;  our  hearts,  our  minds  live  by  this. 

Thus,  with  the  truth  of  Christ,  the  God-man,  is  con- 
nected the  whole  advance  which  Christianity  has,  by  means 
of  its  new  knowledge  of  man  and  God,  brought  to  the 
world.  To  deny  that  truth  is,  not  merely  to  deny  a  dogma, 
but  to  call  in  question  the  whole  gain  of  Christianity. 
This  is  the  tremendous  import  of  the  contest  of  the  present. 
The  question  of  Christ  is  the  question  of  Christianity  itself. 
Those  who  oppose  the  church's  doctrine  of  the  God-man 
will  dispute  this,  and  I  doubt  not  that  many  of  them  are 
earnestly  and  honestly  disposed  towards  that  gain  which 
Christianity  has,  through  its  higher  knowledge  of  man  and 
God,  brought  to  us.  Not  immediately  at  the  beginning  do 
the  consequences  of  a  principle  reveal  themselves.  But 
they  work  out  from  an  inner  necessity,  and  depend  not  on 
the  wish  of  the  heart  or  the  ambiguity  of  the  thought.  The 
branch  which  the  storm  has  broken  off  the  tree  pioJerves 
for  a  time  its  freshness  and  the  green  color  of  life.  But 
gradually  its  sap  dries,  and  the  leaves  wither.  The  effects 
cannot  be  forever  parted  from  their  cause.  He  who  dis- 
cards the  latter  will  soon  lose  also  the  former.  The 
attitude  a  person  holds  to  the  question  of  Jesus  Christ 
determines  his  answer  to  the  question  of  man  and  to  the 
question  of  God.  He  who  rejects  Jesus  Christ  will  lose 
also  man,  and  will  have  left,  instead  of  the  eternal  soul 
hungering  after  God,  a  slave  of  natural  necessity  or  a 
tyrant  of  selfishness,  in  whose  heart  no  sun  shines,  because 
he  knows  not  the  sun  of  God's  grace  in  Christ.  And  he 
who  will  know  nothing  of  the  Son  will  soon  lose  also  the 
Father,  who  will  be  found  only  in  the  Son,  and  will  have 
remaining,  instead  of  him,  only  an  idea  of  the  universe, 


206  THE   BKEMEN   LECTURES 

which  sees  not,  hears  not,  and  has  no  heart  for  our  sorrows, 
or  only  a  cold  inexorable  law,  which,  as  often  as  anything 
lives,  swallows  it  up  in  the  night  of  death,  the  contempla- 
tion of  which  finally  makes  even  the  heart  of  a  living  man 
grow  chill  in  the  gloomy  waste  of  resignation. 

It  is  not  merely  individual  tenets  of  belief  that  are  at 
stake  in  the  great  spiritual  conflict  of  the  present,  but  the 
holiest  interests  of  humanity,  —  the  holiest  interests  of  our 
minds,  of  our  consciences,  of  our  hearts.  The  centre-point 
of  that  conflict  is  the  question  of  Christ.  This  is  the 
mystery  of  the  person  of  Jesus  Christ,  that  with  him  what 
is  best  and  highest  of  all  that  belongs  to  us  stands  and 
falls.  But  just  on  this  account  we  need  not  fear.  For 
that  the  highest  blessings  of  humanity  will  not  be  lost,  but 
will  always  find  those  who  preserve  them  in  their  hearts, 
this  is  certain.  And  so  we  can  be  also  certain,  that  to 
the  end  of  days  Jesus  Christ  will  have  a  church  of  those 
who  thankfully  confess  what  he  is  to  them  for  this  world 
and  the  other,  and  who  therefore  bow  their  knees  in  his 
name  and  salute  each  other  with  the  salutation :  Praise  be 
to  Jesus  Christ  forever !    Amen. 


LECTURE   VI 

THE    RESURRECTION    OF    CHRIST  AS  A 
SOTERIOLOGICO-HISTORICAL  FACT 

By  GERHARD  UHLHORN,  D.  D. 

FIRST  PREACHER  TO  THE  (LATE)   COURT  OF   HANOVER 


GERHARD  UHLHORX,  D.  D. 


BIOGEAPHIOAi 


Dr.  Johann  Gerhard  Wilhelm  Uhlhorn,  the  famous  court 
preacher  at  Hanover,  was  born  at  Osnabriich,  Feb.  27,  1826. 
He  became  repetent  and  privat-docent  at  Gottingen  in  1852.  In 
1855  he  was  made  consistorial  councilor  and  court  preacher  at 
Hanover.  In  1866  he  became  a  member  of  the  consistory,  and 
in  1878,  abbot  of  Lokkum.  He  produced  a  large  number  of 
literary  works  :  among  the  most  significant  and  well  known  of 
w^hich  is  his  Der  Kampf  des  Christenthums  mit  dem  Heidentlium, 
translated  into  English  by  Professors  E.  Smith  and  C.  J.  H. 
Eopes.  English  title:  ''The  Conflict  of  Christianity  with 
Heathenism."  Another  very  excellent  publication  of  Dr.  Uhl- 
horn's  that  has  been  translated  into  English,  is  his  (English 
title)  "Modern  Eepresentations  of  the  Life  of  Jesus,"  pubhshed 
by  Little  &  Brown,  Boston.  His  style  is  clear,  scholarly,  logical, 
at  times  eloquent,  and  always  interesting.  It  would  be  diffi- 
cult to  find  anywhere  a  more  thorough-going  and  satisfactory 
discussion  of  the  resurrection  of  Christ  than  is  the  one  fur- 
nished by  him  in  this  book. 


SUMMAEY  OF  LEOTUKE  YI 


Just  now  the  resurrection  of  Christ  is  probably  the  most 
hotly  contested  point  in  the  great  battle  between  faith  and  un- 
belief— Not  only  is  the  fact  of  the  resurrection  in  dispute,  but 
also  its  significance — ^The  matter  is,  first  of  'all,  a  historical  ques- 
tion, and  such  questions  are  not  to  be  decided  according  to  dog- 
matic postulates — ^The  earliest  church  believed  in  Jesus'  resur- 
rection— ^This  belief  rested  upon  the  testimony  of  eye-witnesses — 
Necessity  of  explaining  how  this  belief  originated — The  old  the- 
ory that  Jesus  was  only  seemingly  dead,  is  now  generally  con- 
ceded a  failure — ^The  theory  of  visions  among  the  early  disci- 
ples is  at  present  most  widely  held — Nature  of  a  vision,  how  it 
is  produced — Views  of  Renan  and  Strauss — Holsten's  view,  and 
argument  by  which  he  advocates  it — This  theory  is  disproved 
by  mistake  made  as  to  Paul's  great  motive  in  persecuting  Chris- 
tians— Disproved  also  by  the  fact  of  Paul's  not  already  believ- 
ing in  the  resurrection  of  Jesus — Also  by  the  consideration  that 
at  most  Paul's  state  of  mind  must  have  been  one  of  doubt,  and 
doubters  have  no  visions — Disproved  further  by  the  fact  of  the 
large  number  of  the  witnesses,  also  by  the  simultaneousness  of 
the  origination  of  this  belief  and  the  shortness  of  time  allowed  for 
it — Strauss'  resort  to  the  notion  of  popular  delusions,  in  order  to 
help  out  his  vision  theory — In  the  way  of  more  positive  evi- 
dence, the  handling  of  Jesus  by  the  disciples  after  the  resurrec- 
tion, and  other  matters  of  that  kind,  might  be  adverted  to — 
More  important  is  the  empty  tomb — The  resurrection  was  not 
a  subjective  event,  but  an  objective  fact — In  several  ways  the 
resurrection  of  Jesus  has  a  bearing  upon  the  redemption  accom- 
plished by  him. 


VI 


THE    RESURRECTION    OF    CHRIST  AS  A   SOTERIO- 
LOQICO-HISTORICAL  FACT 

BY    G^ERH^Rr)    XJHLHORN^,   ID.   D., 

FIRST  PREACHER  TO  THE  (LATE)  COURT  OF  HANOVER 

/  *5l    S  I  have  been  commissioned  to  speak  to   you  on 
^-^ZA     the  resurrection  of  Christ,  I  am  placed  at  that 
/^Viv    point  of  the  great  contest   obtaining  at  present 
^—"^       with   regard   to   the   fundamental  articles  of  the 
Christian  faith,  where,  probably,  for  the  moment,  the  battle 
rages  most  vehemently.     If  this  contest  has  centred  more 
and  more  about  the  person  and  life  of  Jesus,  so,  in  turn, 
this  latter  has  collected  with  increasing  force  about  the  res- 
urrection.    Here  rests,  as  is  felt  on  both  sides,  the  decis- 
ion.    Always  as  one  accepts   or  rejects  the  resurrection, 
will  he  think  differently  also  of  the  person  and  life  of  Jesus, 
and  so,  too,  take  a  wholly  different  position  towards  Chris- 
tianity and  the  church. 

All,  however,  is  so  combatted  here,  that  I  am  no  longer 
expressing  universal  convictions,  out  propositions  which 
have  been  made  subjects  of  dispute.  For  not  merely  the 
occurrence  of  the  resurrection,  but  also  what  significancy 
belongs  to  it,  is  under  dispute.  While  some,  and  not 
merely  such  as  recognize  the  resurrection  to  be  a  historical 
fact,  but  also  such  as  deny  it,  see  in  the  belief  in  the  resur- 
rection the  shibboleth  of  Christianity,  one  of  the  funda- 

211 


212  THE    BREMEN   LECTURES 

mental  articles  with  which  it  stands  or  falls,  others  have 
asserted  that  the  question  whether  Christ  rose  from  the  dead 
is  simply  an  historical  one  ;  be  it  accepted  or  rejected,  Chris- 
tianity and  the  Christian  life  are  in  neither  case  affected. 

K  the  question  then  is,  on  the  one  side,  concerning  the 
resurrection  as  a  historical  fact,  and  on  the  other,  concern- 1 
ing  the  significancy  of  this  fact  for  our  salvation,  I  have 
endeavored  to  put  the  two  sides  together ;  having  so  con- 
ceived of  the  theme,  whose  closer  understanding  was  left 
freely  to  me,  that  my  wish  and  purpose  is  to  speak  to  you 
of  the  resurrection  of  Christ  as  a  soteriologico-Mstorical  fact. 

Whether  Jesus,  as  the  Christian  church  believes  and 
teaches,  on  the  third  day  after  his  death,  actually  came 
forth  from  the  grave  alive,  rose  from  the  dead,  —  this  is, 
surely,  first  of  all  a  historical  question.  For  as  an  alleged 
fact  of  history  the  resurrection  is  reported  to  us.  Whether 
it  is  that  or  not,  whether  what  is  here  related  happened  as 
is  related,  or  happened  otherwise,  or  happened  not  at  all, — 
to  attain  to  certainty  on  these  matters  no  different  course 
can  be  adopted  from  that  taken  with  other  historical  ques- 
tions. A  historical  fact  may  be  proven  only  by  historical 
testimonies,  and  onl}'-  on  the  ground  of  such  can  be  set 
aside.  It  can  on  grounds  of  the  universal  reason  neither 
be  proven  when  these  are  wanting,  nor  be  set  aside  when 
they  are  sufficient  and  at  hand.  The  inquiry  is,  therefore, 
Who  was  present,  saw,  and  heard  that  which  is  said  to  have 
occurred  ?  are  the  witnesses  trustworthy  ?  does  the  testimony 
suffice?  or  is  it  to  be  rejected  as  untrustworthy  and  insuffi- 
cient ? 

This  being  the  question,  I  must,  then,  to  begin  with, 
characterize  one  stand-point  in  it  as  an  unwarrantable  one, 
namely,  the  stand-point  of  those  who  enter  upon  a  his- 
torical examination  with   the   dogmatic   postulate.   There 


THE   RESURRECTION   OF   CHRIST  213 

are  uo  miracles.  With  such  no  discussion  in  a  historical 
way  is  possible.  For  if  one  had  proved  to  them,  by  ever 
so  ample  historical  testimonies,  the  fact  of  the  resurrection, 
they  would  reply.  It  cannot  after  all  be  true  ;  for  the  resur- 
rection is  a  miracle,  and  there  are  no  miracles.  All  testi- 
monies, be  they  never  so  reliable,  do  not  suffice  to  establish 
a  miracle.  It  is  always  more  probable  that  the  best  of 
witnesses  may  have  erred  or  designedlj'^  falsified,  than  that 
a  miracle  has  occurred. 

This  stand-point  I  denominate  unwarrantable,  because 
a  person  has  no  right  to  decide  historical  questions  accord- 
ing to  dogmatic  postulates.  To  be  sure,  I  well  know  that 
it  is  manifoldly  asserted,  that  the  only  truty  historical 
method  is  just  this :  that  the  recognition  of  miracles  be 
absolutely  excluded.  For  a  miracle  is  the  inexplicable 
something  that  cannot  be  understood  from  the  natural 
connection  of  cause  and  effect,  is  not,  therefore,  properly 
a  matter  of  historical  inquiry.  As  if  it  were  possible  for 
history  everywhere  to  trace  up  its  objects  to  their  ultimate 
grounds,  everywhere  to  show  an  unbroken  chain  of  natural 
causes  and  effects.  That  a  miracle  is  inexplicable  excludes 
it  not  from  being  historically  considered.  Justly  it  would 
be  so  excluded  only  on  the  ground  of  its  being  incog- 
nizable. But  incognizable  a  miracle  is  not.  For  even 
though  it  is  the  working  of  a  higher  causality,  it  comes, 
nevertheless,  as  worked, wholly  within  the  natural  connec- 
tion of  cause  and  effect,  deports  itself,  on  the  other  hand, 
in  its  workings  and  results,  like  every  other  fact,  through- 
out in  accordance  with  the  laws  of  nature.  It  is,  there- 
fore, as  a  fact  cognizable,  and  is  legitimately  a  subject 
of  historical  inquiry,  which  has  to  do  with  facts.  The 
exclusion  of  miracles  is  not  historical  impartiality,  but 
dogmatic   prejudice.     In   this   sense   one   commences   the 


214  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

examination  impartially  when  judgment  is  withheld,  until 
it  is  seen  whether  there  are  not  facts,  occurring  in  a 
strictly  historical  waj^,  which  to  us  are  miracles.  I  can 
recognize,  as  warranted  from  a  historical  point  of  view, 
only  the  requirement,  that,  when  the  question  is  regarding 
facts  which  deviate  from  the  customary  course  of  things, 
the  examination  and  testing  of  the  witnesses  should  be  the 
more  earnest  and  stringent.  And,  since  the  resurrection 
is  such  a  fact,  I  do  not  object  to  your  requiring  here  a 
rigid  historical  proof.  Only  this  I  cannot  consent  to,  that 
you  shall  bring  with  you  dogmatic  postulates  over  against 
which  all  historical  proof  is  impossible. 

Now,  as  after  these  preliminary  remarks  we  enter  upon 
the  historical  examination  itself,  let  us  start  from  a  fact 
which  is  denied  by  neither  side,  and  which  cannot  be 
reasonably  denied ;  I  mean  this :  The  oldest  church  be- 
lieved that  Jesus  rose  from  the  dead.  Do  not  misunder- 
stand me.  Whether  this  belief  had  suflScient  ground,  or 
whether  it  rested  upon  delusion,  that  does  not  as  yet  con- 
cern us  ;  that  will  hereafter  be  the  subject  of  our  inquiry. 
At  present  we  affirm  only  the  undeniable  fact,  the  oldest 
church  believed,  and,  indeed,  with  a  confidence  lifted  above 
every  doubt,  in  the  resurrection.  This  is  the  kernel  and 
centre-point  of  the  apostolical  preaching.  Where  Paul,  in 
1  Cor.  15,  states  the  sum  of  the  gospel  which  he  preached 
in  Corinth,  he  reduces  it  to  the  words,  that  Christ  died, 
was  buried,  and  rose  again.  Where  he  brings  the  contents 
of  saving  faith  to  its  briefest  expression  (Rom.  10:  9),  he 
Bays,  "If  thou  shalt  confess  with  thy  mouth  the  Lord 
Jesus,  and  shalt  believe  in  thine  heart  that  God  hath  raised 
him  from  the  dead,  thou  shalt  be  saved."  He  declares 
himself  to  be  a  false  witness,  his  preaching  and  the  faith 
of  Christian  believers  vain  and  groundless,  if  Christ  be  not 


THE    RESURRECTION    OF    CHRIST  215 

risen.  And,  as  with  the  Apostle  Paul,  so  everywhere  (the 
Acts  of  the  Apostles  attests  it)  the  resuiTection  forms  a 
chief  element  of  the  apostolical  announcement.  Faith 
therein  is  also  the  foundation  of  moral  life,  according  to 
the  New  Testament  view.  It  is  living  in  Christ  and  for 
him  who  died  and  has  risen  for  us,  with  whom  we  must 
die  and  rise.  Here  is  rooted  the  whole  joy  of  faith,  which 
becomes  a  joy  of  suffering  and  d^ing  for  the  Risen  One. 
From  this  faith  the  apostolic  age  drew  its  strength  for  its 
victorious  contest  against  the  heathen  world.  Here  are, 
also,  the  starting-points  of  the  Christian  worship  and  of 
its  peculiar  forms.  The  day  of  the  resurrection  becomes 
the  weekly  festival,  the  day  of  the  Lord;  the  yearly  cele- 
bration of  the  resurrection  is  the  first  deposit  for  the  forma- 
tion of  the  ecclesiastical  year.  In  short,  on  whatever  side 
we  choose  to  consider  the  life  of  the  oldest  Christian  com- 
munity, we  always  come  upon  living  faith  in  the  resurrec- 
tion as  the  impelling  and  actuating  power. 

But  we  can  go  one  step  farther,  without  leaving  the 
ground  of  wholly  undeniable  facts.  The  oldest  church 
based  this  its  belief  upon  the  depositions  of  such  as 
professed  to  have  seen  the  risen  Jesus.  Here  again  we  at 
first  only  state  the  fact,  without  estimating  the  worth  of 
the  witnesses'  depositions.  So  much  is  certain,  that  a 
great  number  of  persons  were  convinced  that  the  risen 
Jesus  had  appeared  to  them,  and  upon  the  testimony  of 
these,  those  who  had  not  seen  him  for  themselves  based 
their  conviction  that  he  had  truly  risen.  At  the  place 
already  referred  to,  in  the  first  and  indubitably  genuine 
Epistle  to  the  Corinthians,  Paul  sa3^s  expressly,  that  he 
himself  had  seen  the  risen  Lord ;  and  when  he  farther 
narrates,  that  also  Peter,  James,  the  twelve,  five  hundred 


216  THE    BREMEN   LECTURES 

brethren  at  once  had  seen  him,  this  narration  rests,  it  is 
unquestionable,  upon  the  testimony  of  these  men  as  Paul 
himself  had  received  it,  and  is  accordingly,  considering 
Paul's  unassailable  veracity,  as  good  as  a  self-deposition. 

With  the  statement  of  these  facts  we  have  not  in- 
deed, I  repeat  it,  by  an}'-  means  as  yet  proven  that  Christ 
actually  rose  from  the  dead,  as  those  believed.  The  possi- 
bility must  be  conceded  that  the  witnesses  of  the  resurrec- 
tion were  self-deceived,  and  so  that  they  deceived  also  the 
oldest  believers.  But  this  we  have  gained.  We  need  no 
longer  take  up  with  the  mere  denial  of  the  resurrection,  or 
with  the  doctrine  so  commonly  advanced  that  the  witnesses 
were  self-deceived.  We  can  now  demand  an  explanation 
of  these  facts ;  we  can  require  that  it  be  shown  us  how, 
without  the  actual  occurrence  of  the  resurrection,  that 
belief  in  it  could  have  originated  ;  how  those  men,  ingenuous 
and  veracious  as  they  were,  came  to  the  conviction  of 
having  seen  the  risen  Jesus.  If  such  explanation  cannot 
be  given  us,  then  that  fact  of  the  belief  in  the  resurrection 
returns  directl}''  with  all  its  force,  and  demands  as  a 
necessity  the  simplest  and  the  only  possible  explanation, 
namely,  that  to  the  belief  the  reality  corresponded ;  they 
really  saw  him  ;    he  has  actually  risen  from  the  dead. 

Only  at  a  price  can  this  result  be  avoided,  namely,  at  the 
price  of  giving  up  every  explanation,  of  saying.  The  resur 
rection,  as  the  church  affirms  it,  certainly  cannot  have  hap- 
pened ;  but  what  did  really  happen,  how  the  belief  in  it  origi- 
nated, that  cannot  now  be  known,  that  must  be  left  as  an 
insolvable  riddle.  Closer  consideration,  however,  shows 
that  this  cannot  be  done.  For  let  us  not  forget  that  this 
belief  in  the  resurrection  marks  the  chief  turning-point  in 
the  history  of  humanity,  the  end  of  the  old,  the  beginning 
of  the  new  era.     To  give  up  the  explanation  of  this  belief  is 


THE    RESURRECTION   OF   CHRIST  217 

to  leave  as  an  insolvable  riddle  the  fact  which  more  than 
any  other  marks  the  profoundest  revolution  in  human 
thought  and  life,  is  therefore  to  relinquish  an  understand- 
ing of  the  history  of  our  race  at  precisely  its  most  deciding 
point.  Such  a  relinquishment  can  indeed  be  expressed  by 
individuals  in  momentary  embarrassment,  but  to  carry  it 
through  is  simply  impossible.  The  consequence  would  be 
only  a  repetition  of  that  already  noted.  Such  a  merely 
negative  relinquishment  would  not  hold  out  long  before 
positive  assertion.  If  it  be  impossible  to  explain  satisfac- 
torily the  belief  in  the  resurrection  in  any  other  way,  then 
the  fact  that  Christianity  and  the  church  rest  upon  this 
belief,  that  from  this  belief  the  new  era  has  originated,  will 
ever  necessitate  the  conclusion  that  the  resurrection  is  itself 
a  fact. 

Indeed,  while  Bauer  yet  occupied  this  stand-point  of  relin- 
quishment, and  asserted  that  what  the  resurrection  is  in 
itself  lies  outside  of  historical  inquiry,  and  it  is  enough  for 
the  latter  to  know  there  was  belief  in  the  resurrection,  this 
stand-point  must  be  regarded  as  one  already  abandoned. 
Rather  is  the  problem,  positively  to  show  how  the  disciples 
came  to  such  belief,  recognized  as  one  demanding  solution, 
and  to  this  —  as  must  be  granted  even  though  the  results 
of  the  labor  be  not  regarded  as  correct  —  much  diligence 
and  mental  labor  have  been  directed.  Whether  the  solution 
has  been  found  we  shall  now  have  to  prove. 

One  solution  is  now  universally  considered  a  failure, 
nay,  it  is  overwhelmed  by  all  sides  with  scorn  and  contempt, 
though  formerly  numbering  men  like  Schleiermacher  among 
its  representatives.  It  is  the  view  that  the  actuality  of  the 
resurrection  consists  in  the  resuscitation  of  Jesus  from  an 
apparent  death.  Not  really  dead,  but  only  in  a  death-like 
deep  sleep,  he  was  by  the  coolness  of  the  tomb  and  the 


218  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

seasonable  help  of  confidential  friends  —  whom  the  old 
rationalism,  with  its  naturalistic  explanation  of  the  miracles 
60  readily  summoned  to  its  help  —  restored  to  life,  and  thus 
showed  himself  to  his  disciples.  That  this  view  is  unten- 
able, no  extended  argument  is  needed  to  show.  It  does 
not  agree  with  the  surely  attested  facts,  neither  with  the 
fact  of  his  death,  wliich  was  doubted  only  to  be  able  to  have 
him  the  more  easily  raised,  nor  with  what  is  reported  of  his 
appearances  after  the  resurrection.  Besides,  it  does  not  at 
all  suffice  to  explain  the  belief  in  a  risen  Lord.  "  A  half- 
dead  man  crawling  out  of  the  grave,"  says  Strauss  justly, 
"  a  man  creeping  about,  sickly,  in  need  of  the  physician's 
care,  of  bandages  and  restoratives,  could  never  have  made 
upon  the  disciples  the  impression  of  his  being  the  victor 
over  death  and  the  grave,  of  his  being  the  Lord  of  life,  which 
impression  lay  at  the  basis  of  their  subsequent  career,  could 
never  have  changed  their  mourning  into  enthusiasm." 
To-day,  as  said,  this  hypothesis  is  one  of  the  past.  I  would 
scarcely  have  alluded  to  it,  were  it  not  of  interest  to  see  in 
it  an  example  of  the  way  it  goes  with  such  hypotheses.  In 
their  time  commended  as  the  truly  scientific,  as  the  only 
tenable  views,  they  are  a  few  years  later  brought  forward 
with  a  pitful  smile  as  mere  antiquities. 

Undoubtedly,  as  I  am  willing  to  grant,  the  step  from  the 
old  rationalistic  view  of  an  apparent  death  to  the  view 
obtaining  most  widely  at  present,  that  of  visions,  marks  an 
advance.  The  opposition  has  become  more  historical  than 
was  the  thoroughly  unhistorical  old  rationalism.  It  is  ad- 
mitted, as,  indeed,  in  view  of  the  evidences  at  hand  it  could 
not  but  be,  that  the  disciples  really  saw  Jesus  after  his 
death,  alive,  risen  ;  only  their  seeing  was  not  objective,  not 
the  seeing  of  an  actually  existing  object  external  to  them, 
but  a  merely  subjective  occurrence,  an  internal  seeing,  a 


THE    RESURRECTION    OF    CHRIST  219 

vision.  B  ioause  they  were  not  in  condition  to  distinguish 
this  visionary  seeing  from  the  seeing  of  an  actually  existing 
object,  they  were  of  necessity  firmly  convinced,  and  with 
then*  the  churches  believing  their  testimony,  that  the  Lord 
was  actually  present,  that  he  had  risen  from  the  dead  and 
appeared  to  them.  The  question,  accordingly,  shapes 
itself  thus  :  Were  the  appearances  of  the  risen  Lord,  which 
Paul  recounts,  actual,  real  objective  appearances,  or  mere 
visions  ? 

To  come  nearer  to  this  question,  I  shall  unavoidably 
have  to  premise  somewhat  on  the  nature  and  origin  of 
visions  in  general. 

All  sens^ation,  seeing  and  hearing,  is  an  internal  occur- 
rence. Onj-  nerves  of  sense,  the  optic  and  auricular  nerves, 
are  excite  i  by  the  pictures  and  sounds  of  the  world  about 
us.  The  -sensations  thus  occasioned  are  internal ;  we  see 
the  pictiy  es  and  hear  the  sounds  within.  But  we  learn  by 
experie^.ce  to  think  of  the  objects  which  occasioned  these 
sensat'ons  as  being  in  the  world  about  us.  Now,  the 
nerves  of  sense  can  be  excited  wholly  from  within  as  the 
result  of  peculiar  physical  or  mental  states.  Then  we  see 
pictures  and  hear  sounds  in  themselves  distinguished  by 
nothing  from  the  excitements  produced  by  external  objects. 
These  are  produced  by  the  unconsciously  working  imagina- 
tion ;  and  just  because  it  does  work  unconsciously  these 
excitements  are  independent  of  the  person's  will,  because, 
farther,  these  pictures  are  not,  like  those  of  the  consciously 
working  imagination,  lightless,  colorless,  and  soundless, 
but  appear  in  the  e3^e's  field  of  vision  with  full  lustre  of 
light  and  color,  are  heard  with  full  sound  by  the  ear,  quite 
naturally  the  visionary,  following  his  other  experience, 
thinks  of  the  pictures  he  sees,  of  the  sounds  he  hears,  as 


220  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

being  in  space  outside  of  himself,  and  is  convinced  of  having 
seen  and  heard  that  which  was  truly  objectively  present. 

Still  more  important  for  us  is  a  look  into  the  origination 
of  a  vision,  if  we  would  understand  fully  what  those  have 
to  do  who  undertake  to  explain  the  appearances  of  the 
risen  Saviour  as  visions.  Evidently  what  the  vision-seer 
sees  and  hears  must  have  lain  previously  in  him.  The 
vision-seer's  imagination  produces  nothing  wholly  new ;  it 
only  reproduces  that  which  lived  beforehand  in  his  con- 
sciousness. While  he  is  busying  himself  constantly  there- 
with, separating  himself  from  the  actual  world  and  burying 
himself  meditatively  in  himself,  an  unnatural  tension  of  the 
nerves  arises.  The  excitement  of  the  mind  works  upon  the 
circulation  of  the  blood ;  the  activity  of  the  central  organ, 
the  brain,  increases  ;  the  circulation  of  the  blood  is  accel- 
erated ;  upon  the  excited  nerves  a  pressure  is  exerted ; 
and  suddenly  the  picture  already  in  the  thoughts  rises  up 
with  full  lustre  of  light  and  color  before  the  eye  ;  suddenly 
the  words  engaging  his  meditation  strike  aloud  upon  the 
ear.  What  he  sees  is  nothing  new  ;  it  is  only  the  embody- 
ing of  that  with  which  he  had  long  been  meditatively  carry- 
ing himself  about ;  and  what  he  hears  is  only  the  voicing 
of  that  with  which  he  was  long  inwardly  agitated.  The 
vision  is,  though  unconsciously  to  him,  his  own  act,  the 
product  of  his  own  inner  life. 

It  will  now  probably  be  understood  what  is  the  task 
devolved  upon  those  who  assert,  —  the  appearances  of  the 
risen  Lord  were  only  visions.  They  must  show  us  that 
such  visions,  as  acts  of  the  disciples  themselves,  as  prod- 
ucts of  their  inner  life,  were,  according  to  the  peculiarity 
of  this  life  and  under  the  circumstances  historically  demon- 
strable to  have  existed  in  connection  with  it,  possible. 

The  mere  assertion,  they  were  visions,  settles  nothing; 


THE   RESURRECTION    OF   CHRIST  221 

for  no  one  will  fail  to  see  that  there  are  presented,  even 
to  first  sight,  at  least  circumstances  which  are  anything 
else  than  favorable  to  the  originating  of  such  visions. 
How,  it  is  involuntarily  asked,  could  there  have  originated 
with  the  disciples  who  by  the  death  of  the  Lord  were  so 
utterly  disheartened,  and  with  Paul,  the  rage-breathing 
persecutor  of  the  Lord,  from  within,  by  the  action  of  their 
own  minds,  the  picture  of  this  same  Lord  risen  from  the 
dead?  So  frivolously  as  Ren  an  essays,  with  his  "halluci- 
nated woman  who  has  given  to  the  world  a  resurrected 
God,"  this  difficulty  is  not  to  be  overcome,  and  it  must  be 
mentioned  to  the  honor  of  German  science,  that  it  has  not 
so  lightly  dealt  with  it.  Strauss,  and  especially,  in  later 
times,  Holsten,  have  directed  much  labor  and  ingenuity  to 
proving  the  possibility  of  visions. 

To  the  idea  of  a  vision  the  appearance  of  Christ,  granted 
to  Paul  on  the  way  to  Damascus,  is  best  adapted. 
Accordingly  the  custom  is  to  start  from  this,  in  order 
afterwards  from  its  visionary  character  to  draw  conclu- 
sions respecting  the  appearances  witnessed  bj^  the  other 
disciples,  which  Paul  evidently  ranks  in  the  same  class 
with  the  one  granted  to  him. 

A  circumstance  here  affords  much  help.  Paul  had 
besides  this  other  visions.  He  was,  it  is  said,  a  vision- 
seer,  constituted  such  in  body  and  soul.  The  easier  is  it 
thus  to  explain,  also,  the  appearance  of  Christ  which 
formed  the  turning-point  in  his  life,  which  converted  him 
from  a  persecutor  to  an  apostle.  And  yet  even  here  great 
difficulties  arise.  Certainly,  Paul  had  visions.  He  him- 
self tells  us,  in  2  Cor.  12  ch.,  of  the  visions  he  has  had. 
That  these  visions  were  also  revelations,  —  the  vision  thus 
becoming  the  medium  for  divine  revelation,  —  this  we  may 
let  pass.     The  main  thing  is  that  Paul,  as  no  one  who 


222  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

impartially  compares  his  own  reports  will  fail  to  see, 
speaks  altogether  differently  of  the  appearance  of  Christ 
near  Damascus  from  the  way  he  does  of  these  visions.  Of 
these  he  speaks  evidently  with  great  reserve.  Hitherto  he 
has  not  mentioned  them.  He  comes  to  them  only  when 
compelled  to  do  so  by  his  enemies.  These  form  a  part  of 
his  private  life,  which  he  only  reluctantly  discloses.  Of 
that  appearance  of  Christ,  on  the  contrary,  he  speaks  with 
entire  openness.  He  often  appeals  to  it.  Its  narration 
unquestionably  formed  an  element  in  his  public  discourses. 
Moreover,  where  Paul  speaks  of  these  visions,  he  describes 
very  plainly  his  state  as  one  of  ecstasy.  "Whether  he  was 
in  the  body,  or  out  of  the  body,  he  is  even  unable  to  tell. 
Nothing  of  all  this,  where  he  narrates  the  appearance  of 
the  risen  Jesus.  There  he  uses  the  simple  expressions, 
"  He  has  appeared  to  me ; "  "  I  have  seen  the  Lord."  Add 
to  this,  that  he  portrays  that  occurrence  near  Damascus 
as  an  altogether  extraordinary  one,  which  was  never 
repeated  with  him,  nor  afterwards  happened  with  others,  — 
for  what  is  worthy  of  especial  notice,  he  calls  this  appear- 
ance the  last,  though  he  subsequently  in  a  vision  saw  and 
spoke  with  the  Lord,  —  that  upon  this  appearance  he 
grounds  his  apostolical  authority,  while  visions  were 
allotted  to  others  also  who  were  not  apostles  ;  and  you  will 
not  be  able  to  escape  the  impression,  that  Paul  very 
consciously  makes  a  distinction  between  those  visions  and 
this  appearance.  However,  I  do  not  now  straightway 
conclude  that  because  Paul  regarded  that  appearance  of 
the  risen  Lord  not  as  a  vision,  it  could,  consequently,  have 
been  none.  For  to  this  it  might  be  replied.  All  vision- 
seers  are  unconscious  that  what  they  see  has  no  objective 
reality  corresponding  to  it ;  rather  are  they,  since  the 
vision  makes  upon  them  the  impression  solely  of  objective 


THE   RESURRECTION   OF   CHRIST  223 

reality,  able  to  think  of  such  alone.  I  conclude  only,  and 
this  I  believe  to  be  just,  that  Paul  received  from  each  of 
the  two  events  an  altogether  different  impression,  and  also 
that  in  each  case  his  bodily  state  must  have  been  a 
different  one,  and  I  think  this  knowledge  is,  to  say 
no  more,  not  exactly  favorable  to  the  hypothesis  of  a 
vision. 

But  the  decision  cannot  rest  here.  It  rests  with  the 
question,  whether  it  is  possible  to  understand  the  vision  as 
an  internal  act  of  Paul  himself;  whether  the  attempt  to  ex- 
plain psj'Chologically,  according  to  the  peculiarity  of  Paul 
and  his  state,  the  arising  of  such  a  vision  in  him,  has  suc- 
ceeded. No  one  has  undertaken  the  matter  more  funda- 
mentally than  has  Holsten.  Let  us,  then,  take  his  repre- 
sentation as  the  basis. 

Paul  —  so  Holsten  argues  on  this  point  —  stood  towards 
Jesus  as  the  other  unbelieving  Jews.  To  him  Jesus  was 
a  false  Messiah.  The  suflScient  proof  thereof  was  his 
death  on  the  cross  as  the  manifest  judgment  of  God  upon 
the  impostor.  So  he  believed  he  was  fighting  for  the  truth, 
for  the  will  of  God,  and  became  a  persecutor  of  the  disci- 
ples. Precisel}^  his  own  feeling,  however,  in  accordance 
with  the  entire  nature  of  the  man,  had  to  become  the  means 
of  his  conversion.  His  persecuting  zeal  brought  him  into 
continual  immediate  contact  with  those  who  believed  in  the 
Crucified  One  as  the  Messiah.  So  this  belief  was  made  a 
subject  of  his  emotional  interest.  According  to  his  spiritual 
endowment  accustomed  to  consistent  thinking,  he  was  ne- 
cessitated to  endeavor  to  apprehend,  in  the  thinking  spirit, 
the  contradiction  between  that  Messianic  belief  and  the 
divine  truth  of  Judaism.  Accordingly,  while  still  an  en- 
thusiastic zealot,  he  carried  about  continually  with  him  the 
elements  of  that  belief,  though  in  the  negative  form  and 


1224  THE    BREMEN   LECTURES 

negatived.  Nay,  he  penetrated  deeper  into  the  thought  of 
the  death  on  the  cross,  though  always  yet  in  the  interest 
of  denial,  than  did  his  then  opponents.  If  this  death  ap- 
peared to  him  to  be  the  one  sufficient  proof  against  the 
Messiahship  of  Jesus,  his  opponents  held  up  on  the  other 
hand  the  fact  of  the  resurrection,  by  which  the  offence  of 
the  cross  was  for  them  set  aside.  Impostors,  as  Paul  could 
soon  see,  these  his  opponents  were  not.  Considering  the ' 
clearness  of  his  sense  and  the  profoundly  religious  tendency 
of  his  mind,  he  must  rather  have  been  convinced  that  the 
resurrection  was,  to  his  opponents,  a  subjective  certainty. 
And  having  once  conceded  that,  he  had  no  tenable  ground 
left  for  denying  its  objective  certainty.  For  that  a  man 
could  rise  from  the  dead,  Paul  as  a  Pharisee  did  not  deny ; 
the  resurrection  in  itself  was  rather  an  article  of  his  own 
belief.  What  reason,  then,  had  he  for  denying  that  this 
Jesus  had  risen?  The  hitherto  purely  negative  elements 
began  to  assume  a  positive  nature.  What  if  these  Chris- 
tians were  right?  What  if  Jesus  had  really  risen  from  the 
dead?  Might  not  even  the  death  on  the  cross  be  conceived 
of  as  in  accordance  with  God's  will,  nay,  as  necessarily  be- 
longing to  tlie  Messianic  work?  And  if  this  was  so,  was 
he  not,  then,  under  the  delusion  of  his  fighting  for  God 
against  falsehood,  rather  fighting  against  God  for  unbe- 
lief? Such  thoughts  as  these  busied  him  more  and  more, 
and  the  contradiction  thus  arisen  in  him,  a  man  like  Paul 
could  not  leave  unsolved.  It  forced  him  into  a  brooding 
subjectiveness  of  life,  in  which  all  the  powers  of  his  spirit 
were  directed  to  solving  this  contradiction.  In  this  agita- 
tion of  his  inward  being,  it  was  always  the  risen  Lord 
towards  whom  he  looked  ;  the  risen  Lord  was  the  thorn  on 
which  his  soul  was  wounded.  His  picture  lay,  therefore, 
already  in  the  soul  of  Paul.     It  needed  only  a  profound 


THE    RESURRECTION    OF    CHRIST  225 

shock  of  his  sph-itual  life,  which,  working  upon  the  tension 
of  his  nervous  life,  affected  the  optic  nerve,  and  the  picture 
of  the  risen  Lord,  transfigured  in  celestial  glory,  stood  be- 
fore his  eyes. 

However  consistent  this  picture,  drawn  not  without 
ps3^chological  art,  of  the  change  of  the  inner  life  with  Paul 
may  appear  to  man}^  I  must  nevertheless  afl3rm,  it  is 
limned  from  the  imagination,  and  does  not  agree  with 
what  we  know  thereof  from  history.  The  presupposition 
of  the  given  portraiture  of  the  conflict  arisen  in  Paul  is, 
that  he  persecuted  the  Christians  on  account  of  their 
Messianic  belief,  that  the  fighting  between  him  and  his 
opponents,  which  was  then  repeated  in  Paul  himself  and 
there  spiritually  fought  out,  finds  its  acme  in  the  question. 
Is  Jesus  the  true,  or  a  false  Messiah  ?  This,  however,  is 
alread}^  a  departure  from  the  historical  representation. 
Where  Paul  tells  us,  in  Gal.  1,  how  he  persecuted  the 
church  of  God,  he  adds,  "  And  I  was  more  exceedingly 
zealous  of  the  traditions —  i.  e.,  the  law  —  of  my  fathers." 
Because  he  saw  the  law  was  threatened,  he  became  a  per- 
secutor, not  because  the  Christians  afllrmed,  Jesus  is  the 
Messiah.  So  also  the  Acts  of  the  Apostles  attests  that 
what  brought  the  first  persecution  to  an  outbreak  was  the 
danger  to  the  law  from  the  Christians.  This,  moreover, 
independently  of  the  Acts,  stands  sure ;  for  undoubtedly 
the  persecution  did  not  commence  immediately  after  the 
founding  of  the  Christian  communitj^,  but  this  had  first  a 
period  of  rest.  As  certainly,  however,  as  the  believers 
from  the  beginning  with  full  definiteness  confessed  Jesus 
as  the  Messiah,  so  certainl}^  this  confession  cannot  have 
been  the  cause  of  the  persecution,  or  it  should  have  broken 
out  directly.  Not  until  the  opposition  of  the  new  com- 
munity to   the   legal   establishment   became   evident,  and 


226  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

indeed  first  in  Stephen,  did  the  persecution  break  out.  It 
was  this  also  that  made  of  the  Pharisee  Paul  a  persecutor, 
viz.,  his  zeal  for  the  law.  Not  the  question  about  the 
Messiahship  of  Jesus  can,  therefore,  have  marked  the  acme 
of  his  opposition  to  the  Christians,  but  the  question  about 
the  law  and  his  significancy.  It  must,  therefore,  have 
been  also  this  that  preponderantly  busied  him.  Not  that 
the  question.  Is  Jesus  the  Messiah?  did  not  also  engage 
his  thoughts,  but  the  all-controlling  question  filling  his 
whole  spirit,  it  cannot  have  been. 

If  thus  the  foundation  of  Holsten's  representation  falls 
already,  it  does  not  do,  in  other  respects,  what  was  re- 
quired of  it.  To  make  us  understand  that  a  vision  could 
have  arisen  in  Paul,  Holsten  must  show  us  that  Paul  be- 
lieved already  in  the  resurrection ;  for  you  remember,  the 
imagination  does  not  produce,  it  only  reproduces,  —  the 
visionary  picture  rises  only  where  ii  .ies  already  in  the 
soul.  Therefore,  Holsten  adduces  the  considerations,  that 
the  joj^ous  certainty  of  the  believers  made  an  impression 
on  Paul,  that  he  could  not  take  these  to  be  impostors,  that 
he  must  have  been  convinced  of  at  least  the  subjective 
actuality  of  the  alleged  appearances  of  the  risen  Lord, 
and  then  had  no  ground  left  for  his  denying  their  objective 
actuality.  I  ask  you,  how  does  this  accord  with  the 
description  which  Paul  himself  gives  of  his  spiritual  state 
at  the  time,  in  Gal.  1,  where  we  read  nothing  of  wavering 
and  becoming  doubtful,  but  all  indicates  growing  zeal  in 
persecution  and  increasing  blindness?  "I  profited  in  the 
Jews'  religion  above  many  my  equals  in  mine  own  nation." 
How  does  it  accord  with  the  fact  that  Paul  here  represents 
the  transition  as  one  altogether  sudden?  Should  any  one, 
however,  wish  to  say,  that,  up  to  the  moment  when  the 
vision  occurred,  he  was  unconscious  of  the  change  which 


THE    RESURRECTION    OF   CHRIST  227 

had  really  already  taken  place  in  him,  that  now  first  it 
comes  clearly  to  his  mind,  — then,  I  ask,  Did  Paul  never 
think  of  that  afterwards  ?  Would  not  his  clear,  inquiring 
intelligence,  going  everywhere  to  the  ultimate  grouna  of 
things,  have  subsequently  perceived  that  the  first  impulse 
to  the  entire  change  was,  after  all,  given  by  the  testimony 
of  the  believers?  And,  if  this  cannot  have  remained  con- 
cealed from  him,  how  can  he,  then,  with  such  definiteness 
disavow  all  human  mediation  in  his  conversion,  and  aflSrm 
that  he  was  called,  not  of  men,  neither  by  man?  How  can 
he  refer  all  so  exclusivelj-  to  immediate  revelation  ? 

But  here  is  a  still  more  questionable  weakness  of  the  de- 
velopment that  Holsten  gives.  I  will,  if  you  please,  grant 
that  doubts  could  have  risen  in  the  soul  of  Paul,  whether  he 
was  in  the  right,  or  the  Christians  ;  questions  such  as,  Could 
it  not,  indeed,  be  true  what  those  aflSrm  of  the  resurrection 
of  this  Jesus?  That,  however,  is  far  from  suflScing  to  ex- 
plain a  vision.  Such  an  event  occurs  only  where  one 
thought  with  full  certainty  fills  the  whole  soul.  Doubtfal- 
minded  persons  have  no  visions,  but  believers  who  with 
their  whole  souls  are  wrapped  up  in  what  they  believe. 
Because  the  Maid  of  Orleans  already  believed  with  the 
fullest  certainty  in  her  mission,  she  saw  sights  and  heard 
voices  which  conveyed  that  mission  to  her.  Holsten  ought 
to  have  shown  how  Paul,  without  having  yet  had  the  ap- 
pearance, could  come  to  the  firm,  at  least,  for  the  moment, 
firm  conviction  :  This  Jesus  has  reall}^  risen  from  the  dead  ! 
Instead  thereof,  he  speaks  always  only  of  a  contradiction, 
of  a  conflict  in  Paul.  It  avails  nothing  to  paint  for  us  this 
contradiction  as  an  unendurable  one,  which  had  to  be  solved, 
this  conflict  as  one  which  took  hold  of  Paul's  entire  being, 
forced  him  wholl}^  into  subjectiveness.  The  question  is. 
What  was  there  in  this  contradiction  that  decided  Paul  for 


228  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

the  faith  which  till  then  he  had  so  energetically  persecuted  ? 
What  was  there  in  the  conflict  that  determined  the  victory 
on  the  side  against  which  Paul  had  up  to  that  time  with  all 
his  power  striven?  The  testimony  of  the  believers?  But 
they  were,  in  his  eyes,  the  enemies  of  God,  against  whom 
he  defended  the  traditions  of  his  fathers !  The  circum- 
stance, that  he  could  oppose  nothing  to  their  assertion, 
Christ  has  risen  from  the  dead,  because  he  himself  believed 
in  the  resurrection  of  the  dead?  Then  all  the  Pharisees 
would  have  had  to  become  Christians,  for  this  was  the  case 
with  them  all.  His  ah-eady  gained  conviction,  as  Holsten 
intimates,  that  the  death  on  the  cross  might  be  understood 
as  belonging  to  the  work  of  the  Messiah,  as  willed  of  God? 
This,  however,  he  could  have  comprehended  only  on  condi- 
tion that  he  already  believed  in  the  resurrection,  and  so  the 
offence  of  the  cross  was  set  aside  !  Here  Holsten  entirely 
fails  us,  and  here  is,  in  fact,  a  difficulty  which  one  can  sur- 
mount only  by  accepting  the  occurrence  of  some  sort  of  an 
event  which  produced  the  change.  Without  such  an  event, 
this  change  remains  forever  inexplicable.  The  couA^ersion 
of  Paul,  which  transformed  him  from  a  persecutor  to  an 
apostle,  cannot,  as  simply  a  necessary  development  from 
within,  be  understood  ;  it  requires  rather,  necessarily,  the 
appearance  of  Christ  as  an  objective  actual  fact.  Even  the 
master  of  the  Tubingen  school,  Bauer,  saw  himself  necessi- 
tated to  acknowledge,  that  "  by  no  analysis,  psychological 
or  dialectic,  can  the  inner  mj^stery  of  the  act  in  which  God 
revealed  his  Son  in  Paul  be  disclosed."  Bauer,  whom  no 
one  will  call  miracle-seeking,  sees  therein  a  mystery,  a 
miracle. 

But  even  if  it  had  been  shown  successfully  that  a  vision 
on  the  part  of  Paul  was  ever  so  probable,  what  would  be 
gained  thereby  ?     Piiul  is  only  one  witness  of  the  resurrec- 


THE    RESURRECTION   OF   CHRIST  229 

fcion.  Besides  him,  there  is  a  long  line,  — Peter,  James,  the 
twelve,  the  five  hundred.  The  conclusion,  If  the  appear- 
ance of  Christ  to  Paul  was  a  vision,  then  all  the  others 
were  visions,  —  this  conclusion  is  wholly  unallowable  ;  for, 
as  long  as  it  has  not  been  shown  that  these  others  were 
really  visions,  the  reverse  conclusion  is  equally  valid  :  Be- 
cause the  appearances  of  Christ  to  Peter,  James,  etc.,  can- 
not have  been  visions,  that  to  Paul  cannot  after  all  have 
been  a  vision,  to  say  nothing  of  the  possibility  of  attrib- 
uting to  each  of  the  two  kinds  of  appearance,  as,  e.  g., 
Keim  has  done,  a  totally  different  character.  The  problem, 
thus,  would  be  far  from  being  solved.  It  is  essential  now, 
also,  for  these  other  appearances  to  furnish  the  proof  that 
they  were  visions. 

Need  I  demonstrate  that  still  greater  difficulties  oppose 
themselves  to  that?  In  the  case  of  Paul,  the  already  ex- 
isting conviction  of  many  believers,  the  fact  that  many 
were  convinced  of  having  themselves  seen  the  Lord,  could 
be  adduced  as  a  co-operating  factor,  and  j^ou  recollect  how 
largely  Holsten  makes  use  thereof.  Now  that  help  is 
wanting,  and  the  task  is  to  show  how  and  where  the  thought, 
Christ  has  risen !  was  developed  at  first  altogether  spon- 
taneously. In  the  case  of  Paul,  moreover,  there  was  at  the 
disposal  of  the  historian  a  considerable  time  for  the  internal 
conflict  whose  last  result  was  the  vision,  but  in  this  only 
three  days.  In  not  even  three  days,  in  but  little  more  than 
twice  twenty-four  hours,  from  Friday  afternoon  to  Sunday 
evening,  must  the  wondrous  transformation  from  the 
deepest  sorrow  of  complete  dejection  to  full,  joyous  vision- 
producing  faith,  from  the  "  We  trusted  that  it  had  been  he 
which  should  have  redeemed  Israel ! "  to  the  "  The  Lord 
is  risen  indeed  !  "  have  taken  place. 


230  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

Strauss  felt  well  enough  that  this  was  quite  impossible. 
Hence  he  seeks  to  gain  time  for  the  change.  The  disciples, 
he  conjectures,  fled  first,  without  having  had  an  appearance 
of  the  risen  Lord,  into  Galilee,  and  there  the  change 
gradually  came  to  pass.  This  conjecture,  as  Holsten  has 
openly  conceded,  is  uncritical.  "The  third  day  he  rose 
from  the  dead,"  looks  too  definitely  like  a  constituent  part 
of  the  original  tradition.  How  could  the  disciples,  if  the 
earliest  appearances  of  the  risen  Lord  followed  only  after 
a  long  while,  have  hit  upon  the  third  day  as  the  day  of  the 
resurrection  ?  On  this  third  day  the  appearances  must  have 
had  their  beginning,  —  that  stands  historically  sure  ;  to 
assail  that  is  caprice. 

Holsten,  who  has  given  that  up,  seeks  to  gain  time  in  the 
opposite  direction.  Peter,  he  thinks,  must  not  be  regarded 
as  going  about,  spiritually  asleep,  in  the  days  before  the 
death  of  our  Lord.  The  death  was  not  a  fact  breaking  in 
precipitously  and  suddenly ;  its  expectation  had  ever  since 
the  departure  from  Galilee  busied  the  soul  of  Peter.  Con- 
sequently, when  it  actually  occurred,  it  did  not  so  stupefy 
him  that  he  awoke  only  after  many  weeks  again  to  thinking. 
It  only  sharpened  the  pain  of  thoughts  already  pondered, 
the  pain  of  emotions  already  experienced.  It  called  forth 
only  the  most  intense  spiritual  unrest,  that  state  of  the 
sonl  from  which  visions  arise.  One  thing  now  formed  the 
centre-point  of  all  his  internal  agitations,  the  mystery  of 
this  death.  Before  him  stood  the  picture  of  the  living 
Lord,  and  then  his  death.  Was  he  indeed  not  the  Messiah? 
—  after  all,  a  false  prophet?  How  could  He  whom  God  had 
so  endowed,  who  had  spoken  such  words,  done  such  deeds, 
be  a  false  prophet?  But  his  dying,  his  dying  as  a  criminal 
on  the  cross,  —  was  not  that  a  proof  thereof?  Why  had 
Godforsaken  him?     This  contradiction  between  the  once 


THE    RESURRECTION    OF    CHRIST  231 

living  and  the  now  dead  Messiah  was  the  deciding  occasion 
for  the  vision  of  Peter.  It  forced  him  into  a  purely  in- 
ward life,  and  since  the  picture  of  Jesus  in  its  ideal  purity 
was  the  centre-point  of  all  his  thoughts,  this  picture  could, 
with  the  over-excited  condition  of  his  mental  and  nervous 
life,  have  come,  in  its  radiant  features,  apparently  objec- 
tively real  and  still  visionary  before  his  eyes. 

I  will  only,  in  passing,  remind  j^ou,  as  to  this  picture, 
that  it  is  ps3"chologically  incorrect  to  suppose  the  expecta- 
tion of  the  death  weakened  in  any  degree  its  impression. 
The  presentiment  had  been,  could  have  been,  after  all,  but 
one  which  alternated  between  anxiety  and  continual  hope, 
and  the  consummated  fact  did  not  thereby  lose  in  force. 
It  must  have  sunk  the  soul  of  Peter  the  deeper  into  sorrow 
and  despondency  as  the  denial  with  its  depressing  influence 
was  added.  From  the  deepest  dejection  to  the  full  joy  of 
the  resurrection  remained,  therefore,  only  a  period  of 
scarcely  more  than  two  days.  Ask  yourselves,  whether, 
as  occurring  in  this  period,  such  a  change  is  conceivable? 
And  how  far  does  Holsten  bring  us  with  his  development 
of  the  mental  state  in  the  case  of  Peter?  Only,  again,  to 
the  feeling  of  the  contradiction,  of  the  enigma.  The 
question  is  the  same  as  in  the  instance  of  Paul,  what 
brought  the  solution  of  this  enigma?  Over  against  each 
other  stand  the  remembrance  of  the  life  of  the  Lord  and 
the  crushing  fact  of  his  djang  as  a  criminal  on  the  cross. 
What  was  it,  then,  that  caused  the  former  to  triumph  over 
the  latter,  and  not  the  latter  over  the  former?  On  this 
point  the  answer  fails.  Nay,  even  if,  without  the  occur- 
rence of  any  new  fact,  Peter  really  worked  through  to  the 
conviction  that  the  crucified  Jesus  is  nevertheless  the 
Messiah,  from  this  conviction  to  the  belief.  He  has  risen, 
is  yet  a  long  way.     Whence  came,  then,  the  thought  of  the 


232  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

resurrection  ?  That  Jesus  had  previously  announced  this, 
and  this  previous  announcement  was  understood  and  so 
firmly  believed  by  the  disciples  that  the  prophecy  became 
the  source  of  visions,  this  the  opponents  will  least  of  all 
admit.  On  the  other  hand,  they  will  have  to  admit,  that 
he  often  and  very  definitely  spoke  of  his  return  in  glory. 
The  firm  conviction  of  the  primitive  church  requires  this. 
But  then  the  question  presents  itself,  why  do  not  Peter's 
thoughts  turn  in  that  direction?  If  anything  appears  to  be 
a  natural  result,  it  is  the  entertaining  of  the  hope.  He  is 
still  the  Messiah,  he  will  come  again  in  glory  and  as  such 
reveal  himself.  But  the  thought  of  the  resurrection,  where 
are  the  points  of  connection  for  that?  We  stand,  here 
also,  before  a  riddle,  which  can  be  solved  only  by  our 
concluding  to  accept,  in  place  of  mere  internal  events, 
external  facts,  in  place  of  a  visionary  appearance,  one 
objectively  actual. 

There  are  left  us  yet  the  appearances  which  James,  the 
twelve,  and  the  five  hundred  had,  and  which  we  can 
regard  as  standing  historically  sure  beyond  a  doubt.  "Was 
James  also,  then,  a  vision-seer?  And  the  twelve  in  a 
body?  Of  James  we  know  little;  what  we  do  know  of 
him  would  scarcely  betray  visionary  capacities.  And  the 
twelve?  was  there  not,  then,  among  them  a  single  con- 
siderate spirit?  mere  visionaries?  What  kind  of  a  picture 
do  we  get  of  the  circle  of  the  apostles?  and  do  you  not 
observe  how  little  this  agrees  with  the  picture  of  the 
apostles  given  in  the  New  Testament  ? 

Lastly,  the  five  hundred.  Let  me  lay  particular  stress 
on  this  appearance.  You  remember  that  to  the  originating 
of  a  vision  certain  physical  and  psychical  dispositions 
belong,  over-excitement  of  the  nervous  life,  intense  activ- 
ity of  the  central  organ,  etc.     Is  it,  then,  to  be  believed 


THE    RESURRECTION    OF    CHRIST  233 

that  these  dispositions  are  found  with  more  than  five 
hundred  men,  and  indeed  simultaneously,  for  "  at  once," 
Paul  says  expressly,  the  Lord  appeared  to  them,  —  thus 
with  above  five  hundred  men  at  the  same  instant,  the  same 
Qervous  over-excitement,  the  same  excessive  activity  of  the 
central  organ,  the  same  accelerated  circulation  of  the 
blood,  the  same  pressure  upon  the  optic  nerves?  It  is 
only  needful,  I  think,  for  one  to  understand  what  that 
means,  to  see  its  impossibility.  Strauss,  accordingly,  here 
abandons  the  visionary  explanation,  and  speaks  only  of 
delusion  of  the  excited  imagination.  He  mentions  that 
when  Duke  Ulrick  von  Wiirtemberg  was  banished  from  his 
country  by  the  Swabian  League,  persons  here  and  there 
pretended  to  have  seen  him,  or  even  harbored  him  in  dis- 
guise under  their  roofs.  Similar  delusions  may  have  crept 
in  also  here.  So  far  have  we  now  descended,  that  the 
appearances  of  the  risen  Lord  are  only  delusions.  Upon 
delusions  rest  the  beginnings  of  the  Christian  church. 
Such  is  the  sand}^  foundation  upon  which  the  structure  has 
strangeh^  now  for  more  than  eighteen  hundred  years, 
stood.  Truly  I  envy  not  him  his  understanding  of  history 
who  considers  this  possible. 

More  earnest  and  worthy  of  notice  is  it,  when  the 
attempt  is  to  show  that  these  visionary  states  have  in  them 
something  infectious,  by  which,  as  by  S3'mpath3',  they  are 
propagated  from  one  to  the  other,  attacking  even  con 
siderate  souls,  overcoming  even  doubters.  That  is  correct. 
I  will  remind  you  only  of  the  visionaries  in  the  Jansenistic 
controversies  and  in  the  Cevennic  war.  Other  not  in- 
numerous  examples  of  the  kind  will  readily  occur  to  you 
But  no  observation,  I  believe,  is  better  adapted  to  set 
strikingly  in  the  light  the  diflerence  between  those  states 


234  THE    BREMEX   LECTURES 

and  the  appearances  of  the  risen  Jesus  in  the  oldest 
church.  Where  is,  then,  here  the  over-excited,  fanatical 
temperament  which  accompanies  those  states  or  is  their 
cause  ?  On  the  contrary,  we  find  a  considerateness,  clear- 
ness, and  repose  of  spirit,  an  earnestness  of  moral  en- 
deavor which  absolutely  forbids  making  of  the  primitive 
disciples  a  company  of  visionaries,  in  which  one  infects 
the  other  with  his  fanaticism.  Is  natural  law  so  much 
appealed  to,  then  I  shall  be  permitted  for  once  also  to 
appeal  thereto.  It  is  a  natural  law,  that  those  states 
should  continue,  should  immoderately  increase,  until  they 
find  their  limit  in  a  reaction,  and  then,  in  place  of  the 
agitation  and  over-excitement,  come  the  greater  lassitude 
and  inactivity.  Now,  pray  tell  me,  where  is  there  even 
the  least  trace  of  this  in  the  apostolic  age  ?  The  appear- 
ances of  the  risen  Lord  do  not  continue,  do  not  become 
an  abiding,  or  even  for  a  time  an  abiding  element  of  the 
life  in  the  churches.  They  have  their  wholly  determinate 
boundary,  and,  indeed,  one  very  narrowly  drawn.  Even 
those  who  are  not  inclined  to  accept  Luke's  account  of  the 
ascension  and  the  forty  days'  limit  therein  given,  as  his 
torically  established,  will,  nevertheless,  have  to  admit  that 
the  number  of  the  appearances,  at  the  time  of  Paul's  con- 
version, had  long  been  closed.  The  appearance  granted 
yet  to  him  was  something  altogether  extraordinary ;  be- 
sides, was  nowhere  repeated.  It  is,  then,  definitely  the 
last.  Exactly  so  there  is  not  the  least  sign  of  a  reaction, 
of  a  lassitude  after  the  excitement.  Rather  the  certainty, 
Christ  bas  risen,  forms  continually  and  increasingly  the 
source  of  the  victorious  joy  of  faith  in  the  severe  struggle 
through  which  the  oldest  community  of  believers  had  to 
pass.  He  who  considers  the  actual  circumstances  of  the 
church,  and  puts  no  imaginary  pictures  before  his  mind, 


THE    RESURRECTION   OF   CHRIST  235 

will  be  forced  to  concede,  then  there  is  presented  here 
something  else  than  morbid  nature  given  to  visions. 

But  perhaps  it  will  be  replied,  The  possibility  that  all 
these  appearances  were  only  visions  still  remains,  for  as 
yet  we  are  proceeding  solely  on  the  ground  of  the  sub- 
jective spiritual  life.  Yes  ;  not  unless  it  has  been  shown 
that  the  risen  Lord  interposed  at  some  place  or  time  in  the 
objective  world,  did  or  worked  something  in  and  upon  it, 
or  that  there  is  a  necessarj^  connection  of  those  appear- 
ances with  an  objectively  real  fact,  will  it  be  proven  that 
they  cannot  have  been  simply  subjective  visions,  but  must 
have  been  objective  appearances  of  the  actually  risen  Lord. 
Were  I  permitted  now  to  appeal  to  all  the  evidences  which 
I  personally  regard  as  trustworthy,  I  would  point  to  the 
facts,  that  Thomas  laid  his  hand  in  the  places  of  the 
wounds,  that  the  risen  Saviour  ate  in  the  presence  of  his 
disciples  ;  and  I  will  not,  at  least  when  opportunity  for  it 
offers,  suppress  the  remark,  what  peculiar  significance 
these  incidents,  thus  regarded,  attain.  But  I  will  not 
appeal  to  such  particulars,  for  I  know  that  they  are 
doubted  or  wholly  rejected  by  opponents.  On  the  other 
hand,  there  is  presented  one  fact  which  cannot  well  be 
doubted,  and  which  of  itself  suffices  to  prove  that  we  are 
not  proceeding  here  on  the  ground  of  subjective  visions. 

The  tomb  of  Jesus  must  have  been  empty.  This  ap- 
pears not  merely  from  the  testimonies  thereto,  which  are 
only  arbitrarily  to  be  doubted ;  it  is  required  also  by  the 
fact  from  which  we  started,  —  the  belief  in  the  resurrection. 
For  we  shall  easily  persuade  ourselves  that  this  belief  could 
not  have  originated  from  visions  alone.  These  might,  it  is 
true,  cause  the  disciples  to  believe  that  Jesus  was  alive, 
but  the  additional  conviction,  that  he  had  risen  out  of  the 
grave !     For  that,  unquestionably,  the  fact  that  his  body 


236  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

was  DO  longer  in  the  grave  was  needed.  Without  this  fact, 
the  unbelieving  Jews  would  have  had  it  every  moment  in 
their  power  to  put  an  end  to  the  whole  belief,  and  one  must 
have  a  strange  notion  of  the  enemies  of  the  3^oung  commu- 
nity, to  find  it  intelligible  that,  nevertheless,  they  did  not 
do  so.  They  did  indeed  manufacture  the  story,  that  the 
disciples  stole  him  away ;  but  they  never  affirmed  that  his 
body  might  be  found  in  the  tomb.  Without  the  fact  of  the 
empty  tomb,  there  would  have  been  wanting,  even  on  the 
part  of  the  disciples,  so  necessary  a  portion  of  the  proof 
of  the  actuality  of  the  resurrection,  that  belief  in  it  could 
not  have  maintained  itself  even  with  them. 

If,  however,  the  tomb  was  empty,  then  the  question  is 
unavoidable.  What  became  of  the  body  of  Jesus?  Who 
removed  it  from  the  tomb  ?  His  enemies  ?  Impossible ! 
for  then  they  needed  only  to  say  so  to  annihilate  with  a 
single  blow  the  hated  belief  in  Jesus  as  the  Messiah,  and 
that  they  would  have  said  so,  their  hatred  assures  us.  His 
friends?  His  disciples  themselves?  Again,  impossible! 
For  then  they  must  have  been  impostors,  and  that  the 
church  is  not  indebted  to  imposture  for  its  origin  you  do 
not  need  that  I  should  prove  to  you.  Else  unknown  per- 
sons? some  accident?  No  less  impossible  !  for  as  little  as 
upon  an  impostor,  so  little  can  the  existence  of  the  church 
rest  upon  an  accident.  What  if  this  accident  had  not  oc- 
curred ?  what  if  those  unknown  parties  had  not  taken  him 
away,  or  had  not  been  so  obstinately  and  unaccountably 
silent  respecting  their  having  done  so?  Then  there  would 
have  been  no  belief  in  the  resurrection  ;  then,  consequently, 
there  would  have  been  no  church  and  no  Christianity ;  for 
even  those  who  do  not  concede  that  these  rest  upon  the 
resurrection  itself  must  yet  admit  that  they  do  rest  upon 
the  belief  in  the  resurrection.     Will  3'ou,  then,  really  refer 


THE    RESURRECTION   OF   CHRIST  237 

the  greatest  and  most  beneficent  change  which  the  history 
of  onr  race  has  ever  experienced  to  an  accident?  Will  you 
really  attempt  to  hang  the  world  on  the  thread  of  a  spider's 
web? 

On  the  side  of  the  opponents  the  danger  lying  in  such 
reflections  has  been  clearly  seen.  It  is,  moreover,  no  longer 
possible  to  evade  the  question.  What  became  of  the  body 
of  Jesus  after  it  was  deposited  in  the  tomb  ?  Therefore  the ' 
assertion  has  of  late  been  hit  upon,  that  it  simply  remained 
in  the  tomb  ;  but  that  concerned  neither  friend  nor  enemy, 
for  no  one  in  those  days  so  much  as  thought  of  the  reanima- 
lion  of  this  body.  The  prevailing  idea  was  rather  that  the 
soul  of  Jesus,  having  been  by  death  divested  of  its  earthly 
body,  was  reinvested  with  a  new  body.  This  was  the  na- 
tional Jewish  view  of  the  resurrection,  the  view  which  Paul 
held,  and  which  must  have  been  participated  in  by  the  other 
disciples  also.  Not  till  afterwards  was  the  thought  of  the 
reanimation  of  the  buried  body  resorted  to.  Accordingly, 
the  bod}^,  remaining  in  the  tomb,  could  have  formed  no  mo- 
ment whatever  of  proof  either  for  or  against  the  resurrec- 
tion. The  disciples  could  not  have  based  their  faith  on  the 
fact  that  the  body  was  no  longer  in  the  tomb,  nor  could  the 
enemies  of  Jesus  have  come  to  the  thought  of  showing,  by 
an  examination  of  the  tomb,  that  the  announcement  of  the 
resurrection  was  a  falsehood.  After  the  dead  body,  it  is 
said,  no  one  inquired. 

The  embarrassment  must  indeed  be  great  when  recourse 
is  had  to  such  acts  of  violence  ;  for  as  an  act  of  violence  in  the 
face  of  clear  and  positive  testimony,  I  must  characterize 
this  assertion.  I  will  not  ask,  how,  then,  the  faith  of  these 
oldest  Christians  is  properly  to  be  conceived  of,  who  at 
first  are  totally  indifferent  as  to  the  dead  body  of  Jesus, 
believing  that  he  is  invested  with  an  entirely  new  body,  and 


238  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

then  very  soon  abandon  this  view  and  remember  that  the 
bod}^  was  restored  to  life  and  raised  up  from  the  tomb. 
For  so  unquestionably  in  all  the  Gospels  and  in  the  Acts  of 
the  Apostles  the  resurrection  is  conceived  of.     Suffice  it 
to  prove  that  Paul  also  so  understood  it.     To  do  this,  I 
will  not  appeal  to  the  Epistle  to  the  Philippians,  where  in 
the  well-known  passage  it  is  said  that  "  Christ  shall  change 
our  vile  body  that  it  may  be  fashioned  like  unto  his  glorious 
body,"  I  will  confine  myself  entirely  to  the  epistles  univer- 
sally accepted  as  genuine.      I   think  an  unprejudiced  ex- 
position cannot  here  fail  to  discover,  that  Paul  conceives 
of  the  resurrection  as  a  reanimation  of  the  buried  body,  as 
a  restoration  to  life,  which  is  indeed  also  a  glorification,  so 
that  the  body  which  was  deposited  in  the  tomb  in  truth 
arose,  but  not  as  it  was  deposited ;  it  arose  a  changed,  a 
glorified  body.     Else  what  mean  the  expressions  everywhere 
used,   "rise,"   "rose    from   the    dead"?    What  does    it 
signify  that  Paul  in  1  Cor.  15,  between  the  words  "  died  " 
and  "rose  again,"  inserts  the  word  "buried,"  if  this  burial 
has  no  reference  wliatever  to  the  following  resurrection? 
Read,  I  pray  j^ou,  Rom.  8 :  11,  "But  if  the  Spirit  of  him 
that  raised  up  Jesus  from  the  dead  dwell  in  j^ou,  he  that 
raised  up  Christ  from  the  dead  shall  also  quicken  your 
mortal  bodies."     How  can  the  apostle  from  the  raising  up 
of  Jesus  draw  a  conclusion  as  to  the  quickening  of  our 
"  mortal  bodies,"  if  the  raising  up  of  Jesus  himself  was  not 
a  quickening  of  his  body?     Or  read  Rom.   6:  4,  "There- 
fore we  are  buried  with  him  by  baptism  into  death ;  that 
like  as  Christ  was  raised  up  from  tlie  dead  by  the  glory  of 
the  Father,  even  so  we  also  should  waik   in   newness  of 
life."     How  can  the  submersion  in  the  baptismal  water  and 
the  emersion  from  the  same  be  to  him  a  picture  of  Christ's 
burial  and  resurrection,  and  our  burial  and  resurrection  the 


THE   RESURRECTION    OF   CHRIST  239 

repetition  of  that  which  happened  to  Christ,  if  in  Paul's 
view  the  body  of  Jesus  remained  in  the  grave?  Indeed, 
Paul  cannot  have  thought  otherwise  than  thus,  —  Christ's 
body  came  forth  from  its  place  of  burial ;  and  as  Paul,  so 
thought  the  other  disciples.  But  this  faith  could  have 
originated  and  maintained  itself  only  on  condition  that 
the  grave  was  empty.  Then,  however,  we  have  before 
us,  in  the  fact  of  the  empty  tomb,  an  objective,  actual  fact, 
which  furnishes  the  proof  that  we  are  not  proceeding  here 
altogether  upon  the  ground  of  subjective  visions,  but  on  the 
ground  of  real  objective  facts. 

In  this  connection,  I  must  also  characterize  Schenkers 
view  as  historically  untenable.  Schenkel  has  taken  it  very 
ill  that  he  is  classed  with  the  deniers  of  the  resurrection ; 
and  with  those  who  recognize  here  nothing  actual  whatever, 
he  really  does  not  belong.  Rather  does  he  expressly  de- 
clare that  the  recognition  of  mere  visions  will  not  suffice, 
and  that  he,  on  his  part,  regards  the  appearances  of  the 
risen  Jesus  as  "  real  manfestations  of  his  death-surviving 
and  glorified  personality."  But  after  all,  he  denies  by  this 
the  resurrection  in  the  sense  in  which  Christendom  has 
hitherto  believed  and  taught  it.  In  his  view,  the  body  of 
Jesus  is  not  restored  to  life,  but  the  glorified  personality 
of  Jesus  manifests  itself  "  in  a  higher,  glorified  body."  So 
there  is  something  altogether  extraordinary  left,  something 
which  happens  with  no  mere  man.  For  never  yet  has  any 
other  representative  of  our  race  manifested  himself  in  such 
a  higher,  glorified  bod3^  The  laws  and  orders  of  nature, 
which,  to  our  experience,  hold  good  ever^^where  else,  we 
have  thus  overstepped,  and  Schenkel's  opinions  cannot 
favor  those  who  are  willing  to  see  in  Christ  nothing  but 
what  is  human,  and  nowhere  in  his  life  a  transgression  of 
natural  law.     We  have  a  miracle,  only  now  a  miracle  to 


240  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

which  every  historical  attestation  is  wanting.  For  the 
historical  testimonies  at  hand  pertain  not  to  such  manifes- 
tations of  the  glorified  personality  of  Jesus,  but  to  a  resur- 
rection from  the  dead.  If  any  one  believes  that  these 
testimonies  cannot  be  regarded  as  suflScient,  then  he  must 
reject  the  fact  of  the  resurrection  ;  but  so  to  halve  matters, 
on  the  one  hand  not  accepting  what  those  witnesses  depose, 
and  yet  on  the  other  not  breaking  entirely  with  what  the 
church  believes,  thus  suiting  a  resurrection  to  one's  self, 
which  still  is  no  resurrection,  — that  is  to  abandon  history 
and  to  substitute  for  it  fictions.  The  resurrection  is  his- 
torically attested  just  as  the  apostles  announced  it,  this  and 
nothing  else ;  and  Christendom  believes  it  on  their  testi- 
mony. 

This,  however,  as  I  think  has  now  been  proven,  is  satisfac- 
torily attested.  Every  attempt  to  explain  the  belief  therein 
otherwise  than  by  recognition  of  the  fact,  shows  itself  to  be 
inadequate,  becomes  entangled  in  the  greatest  diflSculties  and 
creates  insoluble  riddles.  If  one  weighs  without  prejudice 
the  importance  of  the  testimonies  at  hand,  if  without  dog- 
matic postulates  the  result  is  drawn  from  the  historical  in- 
quiry, this  cannot  be  other  than,  Christ  actually,  the  third 
day  after  his  death,  rose  again  and  appeared  to  his  dis- 
ciples. 

Do  I  think,  then,  to  be  able  thus  to  compel  you  to  believe 
in  the  resurrection,  as  it  is  possible  to  compel  assent  to  a 
rightly  constructed  mathematical  argument  ?  Deem  me  not 
to  be  so  foolish !  It  is  true,  I  am  convinced,  if  the  question 
here  were  concerning  an  historical  event  b'ke  every  other, 
like  perchance  Alexander's  expeditions  of  conquest  or  the 
deeds  of  Charlemagne,  no  doubt  would  arise ;  every  one 
would  accept  it  as  sufficiently  attested.  But  the  resurrec- 
tion IS  not  a  merely  historical,  it  is  a  soteriologico-historical 


THE    RESURRECTION    OF    CHRIST  241 

fact,  which,  as  such, works  with  detenniniDg  influence  upon 
our  thinking  and  living;  upon  its  recognition  depends 
nothing  less  than  one's  entire  view  of  the  world  and  of  life. 
Whether  yo7i  believe  in  the  expedition  of  Alexander  to  India, 
or  hold  it  to  be  insufficiently  attested,  this  of  itself  does  not 
affect  you,  your  thinking  and  living,  in  the  least ;  you  re- 
main, for  all  the  effect  of  that,  still  the  same.  Whether, 
however,  you  do  or  do  not  believe  in  the  resurrection 
of  Christ,  this  makes  necessarily  a  difference,  and  a  radical 
difference,  in  3'our  whole  thinking,  living,  striving,  and  hop- 
ing. For  the  resurrection  of  Christ  from  the  dead  is  one 
of  the  fundamental  facts  of  our  salvation,  of  our  redemp- 
tion in  Christ,  and,  as  far  as  the  Christian  faith  is  faith  in 
the  accomplished  redemption,  an  essential  element  of  the 
Christian  faith.  Therefore,  surely,  there  belongs  to  belief 
in  the  resurrection  more  than  simply  that  one  assents  to  a 
historical  argument.  Moreover,  on  this  account,  one's  as- 
senting to  this  argument  will  depend  upon  wholly  different 
co-operating  factors,  of  whose  working  he  may  be  conscious 
or  unconscious. 

Is  it  really  so  ?  Does  the  resurrection  have  such  signifi- 
cancy  for  the  Christian  faith  and  the  Christian  life?  In 
support  thereof  I  could  appeal  to  testimonies  from  right 
and  left.  Strauss  has  declared  that  with  the  resurrection 
Christianity,  at  least,  what  has  hitherto  been  known  as 
Christianit}^,  stands  and  falls,  and  Presense  once  said,  "  If 
the  resurrection  does  not  continue  an  integral  part  of  Chris- 
tianity, it  no  longer  pays  to  speak  of  the  rest."  But  as  this 
expression,  even  at  the  Ministerial  Conference  where  it  was 
uttered,  called  forth  vehement  opposition ;  so  elsewhere,  it 
is  frequently  asserted,  that  the  resurrection  has  for  Chris- 
tianity^ no  import,  it  can  as  a  matter  of  history  be  accepted 
or  rejected,  —  this  is  a  historical  question,  this  affects  not 

Q 


242  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

Christianity  itself.  For  not  the  belief  that  he  came  forth 
from  the  tomb  alive,  but  the  belief  in  the  living  Christ,  is  an 
essential  element  of  Christianity.  In  regard  to  that  his- 
torical question  every  one  can  hold  whatever  view  he 
chooses,  provided  he  only  believes  that  Christ  lives !  So 
doing,  he  has  retained  the  kernel  of  the  resurrection-belief, 
has  full  right  to  celebrate  Easters  and  rejoice  in  the  risen 
Jesus.  You  see  the  drift  of  all  this ;  it  is  to  make  of  the 
resurrection  simply  a  historical  fact ;  no  longer  is  it  to  be 
soteriologico-historical  in  nature. 

The  greater,  now,  the  delight  taken  in  expatiating  with 
much  rhetoric  on  the  tenet,  "  Christ  lives,"  the  greater 
the  need  of  observing  with  all  dispassionateness  what  is 
left  to  those  who  reject  the  resurrection.  "We  must,  then, 
start  with  the  premise,  that  nothing  happened  with  Christ 
which  does  not  happen  with  every  other  human  being. 
He  died,  his  body  remained  in  the  tomb  and  corrupted. 
Now,  if  the  immortality  of  the  soul  is  held  fast,  then 
Jesus  is  immortal,  and,  in  this  sense,  he  lives ;  lives  per- 
sonally, and,  indeed,  since  even  here  he  stood  in  the  most 
intimate  fellowship  with  G-od,  lives  in  celestial  glory.  But 
on  this  continuance  of  life  no  stress  is  laid,  and  rightly, 
for  it  has  no  significancy  to  us,  since  he  is  thus  in  his  per- 
son removed  from  the  sphere  of  our  life.  We  have  of  this 
his  life  neither  an  understanding  nor  an  experience.  More- 
over, it  is  not  this  which  is  meant,  when  the  living  Christ 
is  spoken  of;  but  that  he  lives  here  on  the  earth,  continues 
to  live,  as  all  great  men  do,  only  in  a  wholly  extraordinary, 
unparalleled  measure.  Closely  scanned,  however,  this  say- 
ing. He  lives,  is  only  a  rhetorical  trope.  Not  he,  not  his 
person  is  meant,  but  his  memory,  his  words,  his  thoughts, 
the  life  excited  and  awakened  by  him ;  or,  if  you  wish  to 
personify   it,  not   the   personal   Christ,  but  the   thought- 


THE    RESURRECTION    OF    CHRIST  243 

Christ,  the  Christ  ia  idea.  The  question,  then,  comes  tc 
this,  does  that  suffice?  For,  if  that  suffices,  then  truly  the 
resurrection  sinks  down  to  the  rank  of  a  historical  ques- 
tion, which  can  have  had,  at  most,  the  import  of  lifting  up 
the  dejected  spirits  of  the  disciples.  For  us,  to  whom 
without  that  it  stands  sure  that  he  so  lives,  the  question 
whether  his  body  was  reanimated  has  no  siguificancy  at 
all,  and,  as  regards  Christianity,  it  is  utterly  indifferent 
whether  criticism  answers  that  question  in  the  affirmative 
or  the  negative. 

Does  this,  then,  suffice?  suffice?  for  what?  Manifestly 
to  re-establish  the  fellowship  with  God  which  sin  has  in- 
terrupted, to  put  away  sin  and  its  consequences,  to  renew 
what  has  been  spoiled  by  sin.  We  stand  at  the  deciding 
point.  Some  one  has  of  late  said,  the  Christian  faith  can 
be  proven  only  to  those  who  have  a  bad  conscience.  If 
you  have  not  that,  or,  in  other  words,  if  you  recognize  not 
the  fact  of  sin,  then  the  Christian  faith  will  always  be  to 
you  a  strange  and  incomprehensible  one,  for  it  is  the  faith 
in  an  accomplished  redemption  from  sin.  Or,  to  refer  still 
more  definitely  to  the  resurrection.  If  you  feel  yourselves 
to  be  well,  perfectly  well  in  the  body  of  this  death  ;  if  jou 
never  have  sighed  under  the  want  and  misery  of  this  life ; 
if  you  dream  that  this  present  world  is  a  perfect  world,  as 
much  so  as  when  it  came  from  the  hand  of  the  Creator,  — 
I  should  not  know  how  I  could  make  clear  to  you  the  im- 
port of  the  bodily  resurrection.  Then,  indeed,  no  resur- 
rection and  renewal  would  be  needed ;  then,  indeed,  all  is 
good,  as  good  as  it  should  be,  and  I  understand  perfectly 
only  this,  that  to  you  the  resurrection  as  an  incidental  his- 
torical event  is  nothing,  that  you  can  quite  unconcernedly 
leave  the  matter  of  its  actual  occurrence  or  non-occurrence 
undecided. 


244  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

Let  me  not  be  misunderstood.  I  make  here  a  presuppo- 
sition, and  readily  admit  that  without  it  I  can  proceed  no 
farther.  I  presuppose  the  fact  of  sin  and  of  its  conse- 
quences, —  that  man  has  apostatized  from  God ;  that  an 
opposition  between  the  holy  God  and  sinful  man  actually 
exists ;  that  sin,  as  it  is  not  a  disturbance  in  thought,  but  a 
subversion  of  the  relation  between  man  and  God,  has 
interposed  destructively  also  in  the  present  world ;  that 
this  body  lias  become  through  sin  a  body  of  death,  and  this 
present  world  one  in  need  of  being  renewed.  If  it  is  not 
so,  if  there  is  no  sin,  if  what  we  call  sin  is  only  a  stage  of 
natural  development,  a  necessary  transition-point,  then 
surely  no  redemption  would  be  needed.  Or  if  sin  is 
merely  a  disturbance  in  thought,  if  between  God  and  man 
an  opposition  exists  not  actually,  but  only  in  our  thought, 
in  our  idea,  then  also  only  a  thought-redemption  would  be 
needed  ;  then  it  suffices  that  the  opposite  idea  be  expressed, 
God  is  our  Father ;  then  also  we  have  enough  in  an  ideal 
Christ  and  an  ideal  resurrection.  If  sin,  however,  is  a 
fact,  then  this  redemption  in  thought  suffices  not ;  the  facts 
of  sin  and  death,  to  be  cancelled  and  put  away,  must  be 
met  by  facts. 

These  facts  are  the  death  and  the  resurrection  of  Christ. 
The  two,  as  Scripture  always  conceives  of  them  together, 
belong  inseparably  to  each  other.  I  do  not  mean  merely 
for  the  reason  that,  without  the  resurrection  of  Christ,  we 
could  not  apprehend  his  death  as  the  ground  of  the  i 
redemption,  or  that  so  the  justification  of  his  dying  as  a 
criminal  on  the  cross,  and  the  Amen  !  of  the  Father  to  the 
It  is  finished  !  of  the  Son,  would  be  wanting.  That  is 
true.  But  the  significancy  of  the  resurrection  goes  much 
farther.  It  does  not  suffice  that  sin  has  been  atoned  for 
and  can  now  be  forgiven ;  we  must  also  be  renewed,  aad 


THE    RESURRECTION   OF   CHRIST  245 

this  our  renewal  is  based  upon  the  resurrection.  ''  Christ 
was  delivered  for  our  offences,  and  was  raised  again  for 
our  justification  (righteousness  i),"  saj^s  the  apostle  Paul, 
and  in  the  first  Epistle  of  Peter  significantly  enough 
regeneration  and  resurrection  are  connected  with  each 
other.  We  are  born  again  by  the  resurrection  of  Christ. 
This  renewal  extends  as  far  as  the  corruption  extends.  If 
this  comprehends  the  entire  man,  then  the  renewal  must 
also  comprehend  the  entire  man,  in  soul  and  body.  If 
death  is  the  recompense  of  sin,  then  even  death  must  be 
overcome,  and  it  is  overcome  by  the  resurrection  of  Christ 
from  the  dead.  Hence  not  even  a  mysterious  manifestation 
of  Christ,  such  as  Schenkel  substitutes  for  the  resurrection, 
satisfies.  Only  the  bodily  resurrection  is  in  truth  the 
overcoming  of  death,  sind  only  in  the  so  risen  Christ  have 
we  the  assurance  of  our  resurrection.  In  a  Christ  so 
risen,  however,  we  surely  have  it ;  nay,  in  his  resurrection  a 
beginning  of  the  resurrection  has  already  been  made.  He 
has  become  the  first  fruits  of  those  that  sleep.  From  his 
resurrection  hope  looks  on  to  the  final  complete  renovation. 
What  the  Scripture  prophesies  of  a  new  heaven  and  a  new 
earth  has  in  his  resurrection  already  commenced.  Without 
the  resurrection  there  is  an  end  to  our  Christian  hope. 

Only  the  Risen  One  can  dispense  the  salvation  acquired, 
only  the  Risen  One  can  continue  the  work  begun,  to  bring 
it  yet  to  a  conclusion.  Take  away  the  resurrection,  and 
it  is  he,  indeed,  who  gave  the  first  impulse  to  the  develop- 
ment, but  this  now,  disconnected  from  his  person,  contin- 
ues itself.  The  risen  Jesus,  on  the  other  hand,  is  the  liv- 
ing head  of  his  people,  tc  which  from  him  constantly  new 
life   streams.     He  stands  In  personal  fellowship  with  his 

1  Gerechtigkeit,  as  in  the  original  lecture,  and  as  Luther's  version  renden 
fikaiwo-is  of  the  Scripture  quoted.  —  Tr. 


246  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

disciples,  speaks  to  them  in  his  word,  gives  them  to  eat 
and  drink  his  body  and  blood.  This  personal  fellowship 
you  break  up  the  moment  you  deny  the  resurrection. 
Then  you  can  have,  it  is  true,  a  remembrance  of  him,  a 
picture  of  him,  indeed,  the  words  he  uttered,  the  thoughts 
he  expressed,  but  not  himself;  you  can  have  certainly  a 
thought-Christ,  a  Christ  in  idea,  but  the  personal  Lord 
himself  you  cannot  have.  And  if  Christianity  is  living  in 
personal  fellowship  with  Christ,  then  with  this  soteriologico- 
historical  fact  of  the  resurrection  of  Christ  from  the  dead 
Christianity  stands  and  falls,  and  that  remains  true  which, 
to  appeal  yet  to  a  higher  witness,  Paul  says,  If  Christ  be 
not  risen,  then  is  our  preaching  vain,  then  your  faith  is 
also  vain,  then  ye  are  yet  in  your  sins,  then  they  also 
which  are  fallen  asleep  in  Christ  are  perished.  The  truth 
of  the  resurrection  is  the  truth  of  our  redemption. 

Permit  me,  in  conclusion,  to  direct  your  attention  to  the 
entire  present  situation  of  the  church  as  connected  with 
this  one  question. 

The  ancient  church  had  to  undergo,  in  the  second  and 
third  centuries,  a  severe  struggle  with  a  tendency  which 
set  out  to  volatilize  the  facts  of  redemption  into  ideas, 
and  to  substitute  for  faith  in  those  facts  knowledge  of  the 
idea,  called  on  that  account  Gnosis.  Sprung  from  a  com- 
bination of  Christian  and  heathen  elements,  it  built  up  its 
strange  huge  systems,  all  of  which  aim  at  changing  the 
redemption  by  facts  into  a  redemption  by  thoughts ;  at 
displacing  the  historical  Christ  by  an  ideal  Christ.  Coun- 
ter to  it  the  church  faithfully  confessed  and  victoriously 
defended  the  fundamental  facts  of  redemption,  of  the  his- 
tory of  Jesus  as  the  history  of  redemption,  as  they  are 
summed  up  in  the  Apostles*  Creed.     We  are  to-day  in  a 


THE    RESURRECTION    OF    CHRIST  247 

similar  situation.  To  us,  also,  a  gnosis,  composed  of 
Christian  elements  and  of  elements  of  culture  which  are, 
alas,  in  many  ways  estranged  from  Christianity,  is  opposed  ; 
a  gnosis  which,  as  different  as  it  is  from  that  of  the  earlier 
times,  has  this  in  common  with  it,  that  it  resolves  and  vola- 
tilizes the  facts  of  salvation  into  ideas.  Suffer  not  your- 
selves to  be  deceived  by  the  circumstance  that  much  is  said 
about  history  and  an  historical  apprehension  of  Chris- 
tianity. The  history,  the  facts,  are  to  this  tendency  only 
the  shell,  which  is  thrown  away  after  the  kernel  has  been 
pretendedly  extracted  therefrom.  It  is  all-important  again, 
as  at  that  time,  to  defend  the  simple  facts  of  salvation,  as 
they  are  contained  in  the  Symbolum  Apostolicum.  Let  us 
faithfully  fulfil  this  duty  of  the  present,  and  not  lose  cour- 
age, because  now,  as  in  those  first  centuries,  knowledge 
and  culture  are  seemingly  on  the  other  side,  because  a 
great  multitude  stands  there.  The  facts  rest  upon  a  sure 
foundation ;  and,  as  they  outlasted  that  storm,  will  also, 
undoubtedly,  survive  this  of  to-day.  Let  us,  however, 
never  forget  that  the  primitive  church  was  enabled  to 
carry  the  conflict  successfully  through  only  because  it 
preserved  the  historical  facts,  not  as  past  and  dead,  but 
as  living  and  present  facts ;  because  it  had  life  and  love, 
which  latter  the  apostle  sets  higher  than  all  gnosis.  This 
puffs  up ;  love  edifies.  Only  he  in  whom  these  facts  have 
repeated  themselves,  who,  from  his  own  experience  and 
not  merely  through  scientific  argumentation,  has  appre- 
hended their  truth,  he  alone  in  the  end  can  answer  for 
them.  He  who  has  died  and  risen  with  Christ,  who,  in  re- 
pentance, dies  with  him  daily  as  to  the  old  man,  and  rises 
with  him  daily  as  to  the  new  man,  he  can  respond  to  the 
Easter   salutation,   "  The   Lord   is  risen ! "  with  full  joy 


248  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

and  victorious  confidence,  *'  He  is  risen  indeed ! "  To 
him  that  was  dead,  and,  behold,  he  lives,  and  has  the 
keys  of  hell  and  death,  to  him  be  praise  and  thanks 
forever. 


LECTURE  VII 

THE  SCRIPTURAL  DOCTRINE  OF 
ATONEMENT 

By  W.  F.  GESS,  D.  D. 

PROFESSOR  AT   GOTTINGEN 


■W.  F.  GESS,  1).  D. 


BIOGEAPHIOAX, 


Wolfgang  Friedrich  Gess,  d.  d.,  was  born  at  Kirchheim,  in 
Wiirtemberg,  July  27,  1819.  He  studied  at  Tiibingen  from  1837 
to  1841.  Between  the  latter  date  and  1850  he  was  assistant  pas- 
tor, repetent,  and  pastor  in  Wiirtemberg.  Between  1850  and 
1864  he  was  theological  tutor  in  the  Missions  House  at  Basel, 
and  member  of  the  Board  of  Directors.  From  1864  to  1871  he 
was  ordinary  professor  of  theology  at  Gottingen,  and  from  1871 
to  1880  the  same  at  Breslau,  besides  being  a  member  there  of  the 
Silesian  consistory.  In  1880  he  was  made  general  superintend- 
ent of  the  province  of  Posen,  emeritus  in  1885.  Among  other 
publications  written  by  him,  are  the  following :  Christi  Person 
und  Werk,  Bibelstunden  uher  John  13-17,  Bihelstunden  uber  Rom. 
1-8,  Bibelstunden  uher  den  Brief  des  Apostels  Paulus  an  die  Bomer, 
Cap.  9-16. 


SUMMAEY  OF  LEOTUEE  YII 


Jesus  revealed  himself  gradually  to  his  disciples— First  makes 
known  his  Messiahship  at  Csesarea-Philippi — Directly  afterward 
begins  to  talk  of  his  suffering  and  death — The  necessity  of  his 
death  repeatedly  mentioned— Then  in  the  neighborhood  of  Jeri- 
cho he  announces  that  the  purpose  of  his  suffering  was  ''to  give 
his  life  a  ransom  for  many" — Afterward  he  spoke  of  the  Jewish 
passover  in  connection  with  his  death,  and  still  later  explained 
that  his  blood  should  be  shed  "  for  many  for  the  remission  of 
sins" — ^The  same  evening,  in  his  parting  prayer,  he  says,  ''For 
their  sakes  I  sanctify  myself;"  as  a  holy  offering— These  four 
utterances  are  the  main  roots  from  which  have  grown  the  apos- 
tles' testimonies  concerning  the  atoning  significancy  of  Jesus' 
death — Man  is  everywhere  free  and  guilty  ;  thepre-supposition  of 
this  fact  is  the  groundwork  of  the  atonement — A  regular  law  that 
seems  to  control  in  the  commission  of  crime,  as  shown  by  sta- 
tistics— This  suggests  and  helps  to  prove  the  Scripture  doctrine 
of  man's  being  a  "  servant  of  sin,"  and  of  there  being  a  regular 
"law  of  sin" — While  man  is  thus  estranged  from  God  it  is 
neither  meet  nor  possible  for  him  to  enjoy  the  divine  favors, 
and  especially  the  Holy  Spirit,  without  an  atonement — To 
make  an  atonement  for  sin  three  things  are  requisite,  with  not 
one  of  which  is  man  naturally  able  to  comply — Jesus'  inter- 
course with  men  soon  convinced  him  of  their  moral  and  relig- 
ious state  as  very  different  from  his  own — This  led  him  to  inter- 
cede for  others,  and  finally  to  pray  that  the  Father  would  re- 
ceive him  as  the  Atoner  for  his  brethren — Though  sinless,  Jesus 
took  the  place  of  sinners,  endured  the  whole  curse,  vindicated 
the  righteousness  of  God,  and  confessed  the  condemnatory  na- 
ture of  sin — How  Jesus'  atonement  becomes  available  for  man. 


VII 

THE   SCRIPTURAL  DOCTRINE   OF  ATONEMENT 

PROFESSOR    AT    GOTTINGEN 

'HE  instruction  wliich  the  intimate  circle  of  the 
/  I  \  Lord  Jesus'  disciples  received  from  him  regarding 
V^^J^  himself,  was  imparted  to  them  with  gradually 
increasing  fulness  and  clearness.  During  the 
first  year  and  a  half  of  their  association  with  him,  he 
expressed  not  to  them  in  direct  words  that  he  was  the 
Messiah,  i.  e.,  the  King  of  Israel  and  of  all  nations  whom 
the  prophets  had  foretold.  By  the  hearing  of  his  words 
of  eternal  life,  b}^  the  seeing  of  his  wonderful  deeds,  by 
the  holy  impression  of  his  entire  personality,  they  were  to 
be  led  of  themselves  to  this  conviction.  Towards  the  end 
of  this  year  and  a  half,  the  enthusiastic  applause  which  had 
for  a  time  been  accorded  to  him  was,  with  the  mass  of  the 
people,  greatly  decreased.  On  the  other  hand,  the  enmity 
of  the  Pharisaic  party  had  risen  so  high  that  Jesus  could 
no  longer  dwell  in  peace  at  one  place,  but  had  to  change 
continually  his  sojourn.  First  now,  and  precisely  now  at 
this  critical  period,  Jesus,  on  a  certain  occasion,  suddenly 
addressed  to  his  disciples  the  question,  whom  they  held 
him  to  be.  It  was  near  Csesarea  Philippi,  far  up  in  the 
north  of  the  land.     And  as  now,  notwithstanding  all  the 

253 


254  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

disfavor  of  the  outward  situation,  the  joyful  confession 
followed  from  the  mouth  of  Peter,  "  Thou  art  the  Christ, 
the  Son  of  the  living  God,"  Jesus  then  solemnly  assured 
his  disciples,  that  he  was  what  Peter  had  declared  him  to 
be.^  With  this  closed  the  first  stage  in  his  instruction  of 
his  disciples.  But  he  immediately  commenced  the  second. 
The  evangelists  narrate  particularly  that  at  just  this  hour 
Jesus  began  to  announce  the  suffering  which  awaited  him. 
Moreover,  he  added  to  the  words  concerning  his  death, 
that  he  would  at  length  return  in  the  glory  of  his  Father 
with  his  angels,  and  then  reward  every  one  according  to 
his  doing.  Intimations  of  both  Jesus  had  already  given ; 
now,  however,  these  two  themes,  the  Messiah's  dying  and 
the  Messiah's  return,  became,  in  Jesus'  instruction  of  his 
disciples,  cardinal  points.  As  a  third  subject,  this  also 
was  joined  to  the  two,  namely,  that  even  in  the  interval 
between  his  dying  and  return  he  would,  invisibly  but  in 
efficacious  reality,  remain  with  his  followers.^  This 
second  stage  of  the  instruction,  which  continued  till  his 
death,  can  be  reckoned  at  perhaps  three  fourths  of  a 
year. 

It  is  Jesus'  utterances  concerning  his  death  that  we  are 
at  this  hour  more  closely  to  consider.  For  the  New  Testa- 
ment doctrine  of  atonement  is  to  be  now  the  question,  and 
for  this  Jesus'  utterances  concerning  his  death  form  the 
most  important  source. 

Since  that  occurrence  near  Csesarea,  our  Lord,  from  time 
to  time,  and  in  nearly  the  same  words,  repeated  the  an- 
nouncement then  made,  that  the  Son  of  man  must  be  put 
to  death.  But  at  first  simply  repeated.  He  named  the 
place  at  which  it  would  happen,  —  Jerusalem ;  he  named 
the  men  by  whom  it  would  happen,  —  the  heads  of  the  Is- 

1  Matt.  16 :  13  flf.  2  Matt.  18 :  20 ;  John  14 :  16. 


THE    SCRIPTURAL   DOCTRINE    OF   ATONEMENT        255 

raelitish  people  ;  he  set  forth  prominently  that  it  must  hap- 
pen, and  would  not,  therefore,  occur  as  a  casualty,  but  by 
virtue  of  a  necessity ;  yet  by  virtue  of  what  necessity  and 
to  what  purpose,  he  did  not  as  j^et  explain.^  Still  on  the 
journey  to  his  death,  he  repeated  in  this  wise  his  saying.^ 
We  may  ask,  why  he,  foreseeing  that  he  will  be  put  to 
death,  nevertheless  undertakes  the  journey?  His  duty  to 
preach  in  this  metropolis  the  kingdom  of  God  was  already 
by  him  abundantly  fulfilled.  Often  had  he,  to  use  his  own 
words,  endeavored  to  gather  Jerusalem's  children  about 
himself,  but  they  would  not.^  Why  does  he  not  now  re- 
main far  from  this  city?  We  see  it  is  that  "  must"  which 
impels  him.  He  has  perceived  in  his  death  a  divine  decree. 
The  hatred  of  men  it  is  that  will  accomplish  his  death ;  but 
he  knows  that  they  only  do  what  must  happen.  Neverthe- 
less, even  during  the  journey,  —  it  took  place  from  the  Sea 
of  Galilee  down,  on  the  left  side  of  the  Jordan  valley,  — 
he  does  not  j^et  explain  himself  on  the  purpose  of  this 
decree.  He  who  reflects  with  due  attention  upon  the  his- 
tory of  our  Lord  will  learn  generally  to  wonder  at  how 
much  Jesus  understood  the  art  of  waiting.  Nowhere  any 
precipitation,  everywhere  calm  considerateness.  Not  till 
they  arrived  in  the  neighborhood  of  Jericho,  and  so  were 
distant  from  Jerusalem  only  one  day's  journey,  does  he 
avail  himself  of  an  opportunity  to  disclose  the  purpose  of 
his  d3'ing.'*  Two  of  his  disciples,  John  and  James,  had 
brought  before  Jesus  the  petition  that,  when  he  set  up  his 
royal  throne,  he  would  make  them  the  first  among  his 
mighty  men  ;  for  the  disciples  could  not  yet  relinquish  the 
notion  that  the  establishment  of  the  throne  was  nigh. 
Jesus  answers  them,  that  they  are  not  called  to  rule  over 

i  Matt.  17 :  12,  22 ;    Mark  8 :  31 ;  9 :  12.  2  Matt.  20 :  18  f.         »  Matt.  23  37. 

*  Matt.  20:  28. 


256  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

men,  but  to  serve.  And  then  he  adtls,  "  As  the  Son  of 
man  came  not  to  be  ministered  unto,  but  to  minister,  and  to 
give  his  life  a  ransom  for  many."  Consequently,  Jesus 
came  to  serve.  Day  after  day,  in  this  j^ear  of  his  public 
working,  his  whole  strength  was  consecrated  to  the  greatest 
rvice  which  a  man  can  render  to  his  brothers,  the  an- 
nouncement of  God  by  word  and  work.  Yet,  not  his 
working  alone,  but  also  his  dying,  is  to  be  a  service  for  men.' 
And  indeed  his  dying  in  a  different  manner  from  his  work- 
ing. He  would  surrender  his  life  as  a  ransom,  —  as  a  ran- 
som for  many ;  therefore,  as  a  substitutional  ransom. 
Those  for  whom  he  surrenders  his  life  are,  then,  in  impris- 
onment. And  they  could  not  escape  from  this  imprison- 
ment, unless  Jesus  would  give  his  life  for  them.  We  see, 
this  first  word  which  Jesus  uttered  on  the  purpose  of  his 
death  was  sufficient  of  itself  to  open  to  the  reflection  of  his 
disciples  a  fruitful  look.  But,  a  few  days  afterward,  he 
added  to  the  first  word  a  second.  It  was  on  the  Tuesday 
before  his  death  that  he  said  to  his  disciples,  "Ye  know 
that  after  two  days  is  the  feast  of  the  passover,  and  the 
Son  of  man  is  betrayed  (delivered  up) ^  to  be  crucified."^ 
Noteworthy  connection  !  What  have  these  facts  to  do  with 
each  other,  —  the  Jewish  people's  paschal  supper  and  the  Son 
of  man's  being  delivered  up  to  crucifixion  ?  It  was  soon  to 
become  clear.  For  as  now,  on  Thursday  evening,  the  Lord 
sat  with  his  disciples,  after  the  custom  of  the  feast,  to  eat 
the  lamb,  he  took  bread,  and  then  the  cup  with  wine,  and 
said,  "  Drink  ye  all  of  it ;  for  this  is  my  blood  of  the  New 
Testament,  which  is  shed  for  many  for  the  remission  of 
sins.'^  The  day  following,  his  blood  was  shed  on  the  cross. 
The  passover  served  to  commemorate  the  establishment  of 

1  So  irapaSiSoTai  is  rendered  in  the  version  quoted  by  the  lecturer. —  TV. 

2  Matt.  26 :  2. 


THE   SCRIPTURAL   DOCTRINE   OF   ATONEMENT        257 

the  old  covenant,  when  Israel  was  delivered  from  the  land 
of  bondage,  exalted  to  be  the  people  of  God,  and  led  out 
towards  the  land  of  its  home.  Every  covenant  was  conse- 
crated by  the  blood  of  lambs.  Now  a  new  covenant  is  to 
come  in  the  place  of  the  old.  But  for  that  purpose  Jesus' 
blood  must  first  be  shed,  —  shed  for  the  remission  of  sins. 
First  the  obtaining  of  God's  pardon  of  sins,  then  God's 
new  covenant  can  enter  into  life.^  And  it  is  the  Son  of 
man,  that  is  to  say,  the  Son  of  humauit}^  the  long-promised 
and  wished-for,  its  noblest  scion,  who  now  is  delivered  up 
to  crucifixion.  For  the  new  covenant  is  not,  like  the  old, 
a  covenant  with  Israel  alone,  but  with  humanity.  On  the 
same  evening  Jesus  spoke,  in  the  parting  pra^^er,  the  word, 
''  For  their  sakes  I  sanctify  myself."  ^  As  a  holy  offering  he 
goes  to  his  death. 

These  four  utterances  of  our  Lord  are  the  main  roots 
from  which  the  testimonies  of  the  apostles  concerning  the 
atoning  significancy  of  the  death  of  Jesus  have  grown. 
Peter  and  Paul  repeat,  in  their  Epistles,  the  word  of  the 
ransom.^  Paul  and  John  amplify  the  thought,  that  in  Jesus 
the  true  Lamb  of  God,  of  which  Israel's  paschal  lamb  was 
only  the  type,  was  given  to  humanit}^'*  The  Epistle  to  the 
Hebrews  calls  the  blood  of  Jesus  the  blood  of  the  eternal 
covenant,  by  which  the  conscience  is  purged.  What  Jesus 
spoke  of  the  sanctifying  of  himself  to  be  a  holy  ofiering  is 
amplified  in  this  epistle  to  the  efiect  that  Jesus  was  both 
the  priest  and  the  victim,  and  that,  since  he  through  the 
Eternal  Spirit  dwelling  in  him  sanctified  himself  as  a  holy 
offering  to  God,  an  eternal  redemption  was  accomplished  by 
him.^  Not  upon  an  invention  of  the  church,  but  upon  the 
apostolical  word,  then,  does  the  belief  of  Christendom  rest, 

1  Matt.  26 :  27  f.  ^  John  17 :  19.  si  Pet.  1 :  18;  1  Tim.  2 :  6. 

*1  Cor.  5:7;    John  19:  36.  «  Heb.  13:  20;  9;  14. 

R 


258  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

to  wil,  tliat  on  Good  Friday  the  atonement  of  human  sin 
was  accomplished ;  i.  e.,  the  forgiveness  of  our  sins  was 
effected  b}^  Jesus  with  his  Father.  This  apostolical  word 
rests  upon  Jesus'  own  word. 

There  are  in  the  present  times  manj^  who  deny  that  man 
is  free,  i.  e.,  has  the  ability  to  choose  among  different  ways 
of  action  possible  for  him.  They  affirm  that  everything 
which  man  has  done  or  will  do  in  life,  he  must  do  as  he 
does,  by  virtue  of  a  necessity  lying  partly  in  his  peculiar 
nature,  partly  in  his  outward  situation.  There  are  many, 
indeed,  who  protest  that  they  have  no  souls,  but  are  mere 
matter.  The  most  effectual  way  of  opposing  such  assertions 
is  by  referring  to  inner  experience.  Man  has  experience 
of  freedom,  for  he  has  experience  of  his  obligation  to  obey 
a  moral  law,  and  of  his  responsibility  for  obedience  or  dis- 
obedience to  this  law.  With  him  who  has  the  resolution  to 
deny  the  fact  of  this  experience  no  farther  discussion  is  at 
the  outset  possible.  But  it  is  also  unnecessary.  For  the 
unprejudiced  part  of  mankind  is  so  conscious  of  its  inner 
experience  of  freedom  that  it  quietly  proceeds  on  its  way. 
The  state  will  continue  to  care  for  the  education  of  the 
young  and  for  the  just  punishment  of  criminals,  that  is,  to 
presuppose  the  freedom  of  man ;  for  education,  as  well 
as  punishment  according  to  principles  of  justice,  is  to  be 
spoken  of,  only  on  condition  that  the  inner  experience  of 
freedom  is  true.  In  like  manner,  my  friends,  the  Christian 
church,  when  it  speaks  of  the  atonement  for  sin  through 
Christ,  presupposes  an  inner  experience ;  and  indeed  the 
experience  that  God  is  holy  and  that  men  are  guilty.  For 
him  who  denies  God's  holiness  and  his  own  guilt,  discourse 
on  the  atonement  for  human  guilt  has  no  meaning.  For 
him  who  in  fact  does  not  deny  both,  but  holds  them  to 
be  matters  of  trifling  moment,  the  whole    subject  of  the 


THE   SCRIPTURAL    DOCTRINE    OF    ATONEMENT        259 

atonement  appears  to  be  not  exactly  foolishness,  but  it 
leaves  him  cold.  The  Christian  church  will  not  on  this 
account  suffer  itself  to  be  confused  in  its  annunciation  of 
the  atonement ;  for  it  knows  that  every  man  who  atten- 
tively gives  heed  to  his  conscience  can  learn  by  experience, 
that  God  is  hoty  and  that  man  is  guilty,  nay,  that  for  every 
one  an  hour  comes  when  he  must  learn  this.  This  ex- 
perience, it  is  true,  has  something  more  of  concentration 
and  energy  in  attending  to  the  inner  voice  than  has  the 
mere  perception  that  we  are  free,  but  it  lies  in  the  same 
line,  only  one  must  go  deeper  down.  This  inner  experience 
I  also  presuppose.  Only  those  who  are  agreed  on  the  same 
can  have  an  interest  in  the  discussion  of  the  atonement 
and  an  understanding  of  the  manner  in  which  it  happened. 
To  this  understanding  let  us  now  seek  to  come  nearer. 

Christ  has  expiated  our  sin,  that  is  to  say,  he  has  effected 
with  God  the  pardon  of  our  sin.  With  this,  to  go  no 
further,  is  connected  that  which  is  strange  to  many.  They 
say,  God  is  love ;  how  was  it  necessary,  then,  that  Christ 
should  first  work  out  pardon  for  men,  and  altogether  by 
his  death?  Surely,  the  God  who  is  love  pardons  everj^ 
one  forthwith  who  asks  him  for  pardon.  I  will  reply  to 
this  first,  Bremen  had,  in  the  first  third  of  this  century, 
among  its  preachers,  a  man  who  belonged  to  the  most 
spiritual  theologians  of  the  evangelical  church,  and,  be- 
sides, was  of  the  greatest  independence  <  f  judgment.  All 
that  appeared  to  him  to  be  merely  human  tradition,  he 
esteemed  not ;  on  the  other  hand,  he  was  totally  penetrated 
with  the  divine  authority  of  the  Scriptures.  I  need  scarcely 
say  that  I  mean  Godfrey  Menken.  No  one  can  speak  more 
strongly  on  this  great  theme,  that  God  is  love,  than  did 
Menken.  Just  this  man,  however,  hesitated  not  to  attest 
that  Christ  —  I  give  Menken's  own  words — "paid  the  debt 


260  THE   BREMEN    LECTURES 

of  humanity,  averted  from  us  God's  displeasure,  disclosed 
to  us  by  his  death  a  new  right  and  a  new  way  to  eternal 
life."  ^  To  him,  then,  it  was  no  contradiction  that  God  is 
love,  and  that,  nevertheless,  Christ  had  to  work  out  the 
pardon  of  our  sin,  had  to  atone  for  our  sin.  Bat  I  ascend 
from  the  disciple  of  the  apostles  to  the  apostles  them- 
selves. John  it  is  who  first  uttered  tliat  great  saying, 
"God  is  love."  Directly,  however,  after  he  wrote  this 
saying  in  the  fourth  chapter  of  his  first  epistle,  he  adds, 
"  Herein  is  love,  that  God  loved  us,  and  sent  his  Son  to  be 
the  propitiation  for  our  sins."  So  John  knew  of  no  con- 
tradiction between  the  idea  that  God  is  love,  and  the 
proposition  that  our  sin  had  to  be  expiated  by  Christ. 
But  we  will  ascend  still  higher ;  from  the  apostles  of  the 
Lord  to  the  Lord  himself.  From  the  Lord  Jesus  humanity 
has  learned  that  it  is  permitted  to  call  God  by  the  name 
of  Father ;  the  prophets  of  the  Old  Testament  never  ven- 
tured to  commence  their  prayers.  Our  Father.  But  our 
Lord  declared  that  he  would  give  his  life  a  ransom  for 
many ;  that  his  blood  was  the  blood  of  the  new  testament, 
shed  for  the  remission  of  sins.  Under  these  circumstances, 
a  clear-seeing  man  will  deliberate  well,  before  he  joins  in 
the  assertion  that,  because  God  is  love,  no  atonement  was 
needed ;  for  he  will  say  to  himself  that  he  by  whom  the 
Father-name  of  God  was  made  known  to  humanity  must 
certainly  have  been  better  acquainted  with  the  ways  of  the 
divine  love  than  is  the  present  generation.  At  present 
men  talk  of  the  divine  love ;  Jesus  lived  in  this  love. 
Moreover,  it  is  not  difficult  for  a  somewhat  more  deeply 
thinking  man  to  perceive  why  God's  love  and  God's  re- 
quirement of  an  atonement  do   not   exclude   each   other, 

*  Comp.  the  Versohnungslehre  by  Dr.  G.  Menker..    In  verbal  extracts  from  hi« 
writings.    18.17,  pp.  13,  20,  21. 


THE   SCRIPTURAL   DOCTRINE   OF   ATONEMENT       261 

rather  are  in  harraony.  This  can  be  made  intelligible  even 
from  our  human  relations.  When  a  man  of  character  is 
compelled  to  know  that  his  son,  by  a  grievous  offence,  vio- 
lates the  moral  order,  his  love  to  the  son  does  not,  on  that 
account,  cease,  but  rather  evinces  itself  in  the  earnestness 
with  which  the  father  seeks  the  son's  conversion.  Yet  in 
the  converse  of  the  father  with  the  son  a  change  takes 
place ;  intimacy  ceases ;  perhaps  the  son  is  even  wholly 
excluded  from  intercourse  with  the  father,  and  this  until 
a  suitable  expiation  of  the  offence  has  been  made.  The 
simple  word  of  the  son,  that  he  is  sorry  for  the  offence, 
does  not  satisfy  a  father  of  character ;  he  asks  the  proof 
of  earnestness  by  an  expiatory  act.  And  this  is  not  want 
of  love,  but  true  love ;  for  true  love  knows  that  the  son's 
welfare  can  only  then  be  secure  when  he  has  bowed  in  the 
fullest  earnestness  in  submission  to  the  moral  order. 

Perhaps  what  has  just  been  said  gives  occasion  to  a 
second  objection.  That  human  father,  one  will  say, 
requires  then  the  expiation  of  the  offence  from  him  who 
committed  the  offence  ;  God,  however,  is  represented  as 
having  required  the  atonement  from  the  only  person  who 
was  without  sin.  I  enter  upon  this  question  the  more 
readil}^  as  it  makes  it  necessary  for  us  to  penetrate  more 
deeply  into  the  kernel  of  the  matter,  namel}^,  into  the  way 
in  which  Christ  accomplished  the  atonement  for  our  sin. 
And  this  is  the  principal  thing.  As  long  as  a  truth  is  not 
rightly  understood,  many  an  objection  presents  itself  with 
force,  which,  for  him  who  has  gained  an  insight  into  the 
matter,  immediately  becomes  forceless.  I  commence  this 
discussion  with  a  remark  which,  at  first  sight,  may  appear 
extraneous.  No  one  of  us  will  wonder,  that  the  relation 
of  deaths  to  the  number  of  inhabitants  remains  every  year 
about  the  same.     We  thiuk,  death  ensues  according  to  a 


262  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

natural  law,  and  this  law  works  every  year  with  like 
strength.  Now,  however,  our  statisticians,  in  the  last 
decades  of  years,  have  found  the  same  regularity  in  the 
case  of  crimes.  "  As  long  as  the  course  of  justice  in 
regard  to  the  prosecution  and  punishment  of  crimes  in  a 
state  does  not  change,"  —  these  are  the  words  of  the  relia- 
ble statistician,  Dr.  Wappaus,  in  his  General  Statistics  of 
Population,^  —  "  the  crimes  repeat  themselves  according  to 
their  number  and  kind,  as  well  as  according  to  their  distri- 
bution as  to  sex  and  age,  with  the  greatest  regularity." 

Many  may  query  whether  this  is  not  a  proof  against  all 
freedom.  But  the  criminals  themselves  have  the  definite 
consciousness,  that  they  could  have  refrained  from  the 
crimes,  if  they  had  only  earnestly  willed.  Besides,  the 
statistics  furnish  other  facts,  which  show  that  freedom  is 
not  a  dream,  but  a  reality.  (I  can  also  for  this  refer  to  the 
work  mentioned.)  Thus  much,  however,  is  incontro- 
vertibly  clear  from  this  regularity  with  which  crimes 
return,  that  it  does  not  stand  as  it  might  and  should  with 
the  development  and  use  of  the  freedom  innate  in  man. 
It  is,  according  to  the  testimony  of  every  conscience,  a 
wicked  contrariety  to  nature  for  a  man  to  murder  his 
brother;  but  so  much  have  the  mass  of  men  surrendered 
themselves  to  the  power  of  the  passions  that  every  3'ear 
about  the  same  number  of  men  yield  to  temptation  working 
with  constant  strength,  and  commit  the  unnatural  crime. 
A  hundred  times  offence  has  been  taken  in  the  name  of 
enlightenment  at  the  Scripture,  because  it  declares  man  to 
be  a  servant  of  sin  and  speaks  of  a  law  of  sin ;  ^  now 
come  the  figures  of  the  statisticians  and  prove  it  is  never- 
theless so. 

Does  not  the  fact  here  present  itself  with  frightful  force 

>  Allgemeinen  Bevolkerungestatistik.  ^  John  8 :  34 ;  Rom  .8:2. 


THE    SCRIPTURAL    DOCTRINE    OF    ATONEMENT       263 

before  our  e3^es,  that  the  way  humanity  goes  is  a  wholly 
different  one  from  that  which  the  holy  Creator  from  the 
beginning  has  indicated  to  it  ?  And  if  this  is  so,  is  it  not 
then  intelligible,  that  the  majesty  of  God  demands  of 
humanity  an  atonement  for  its  sin?  that  the  fellowship 
between  God  and  man  cannot  be  again  restored,  the  Spirit 
of  God  cannot  be  communicated  to  man,  before  the  atone- 
ment has  been  made  ?  God  bestows  even  upon  those  men 
who  are  far  from  him  many  favors.  The  heathen  nations 
to  this  day  enjoy  God's  sunshine  and  rain  and  the  filling 
of  the  heart  with  many  joj^s.  The  same  blessings  are 
allotted,  among  Christians,  even  to  the  despisers  of  God. 
But  these  external  benefits  are  not  the  highest  benefit. 
Only  he  who  has  God  himself,  in  that  God's  Spirit  dwells 
in  him,  has  the  highest  good.  And  these  earthly  benefits 
give  strength  and  gladness  for  only  this  earthly  life.  Im- 
perishable life  can  onl}^  come  from  fellowship  with  the 
living  God. 

He  who  will  think  somewhat  more  deeply  can  easily  per- 
ceive, that,  especiall}'  after  death,  the  impossibility  of  re- 
maining vigorous  and  joyful  without  the  Spirit  of  God 
will  become  apparent.  For  by  death  man  will  be  deprived 
of  the  earthly  sources  of  nourishment.  During  the  earthly 
life  the  self-delusion,  that  the  earthly  can  satisfy  man,  is 
possible ;  but  from  what  source  in  the  future  world  is  the 
nourishing,  strengthening,  beatifying  to  come,  if  not  from 
God  himself?  What  the  Scriptm-es  call  being  lost,  is,  where 
the  Spirit  of  God  is  wanting,  indeed  the  natural,  self-intel- 
ligible, necessary  result.  To  receive  the  Spirit  of  God  is, 
therefore,  for  man  in  the  fullest  sense  of  the  word  a  life- 
question.  And  yet  it  is,  as  before  remarked,  contradictory 
to  the  majesty  of  God  to  give  his  Spirit,  and  so  himself,  to 
men,  before  an  atonement  for  sin  has  been  made.     And 


264  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

how,  now,  is  this  to  be  effected  ?  Men  have  tried  in  differ- 
ent ways  to  bring  about  an  atonement.  They  have  offered 
animals  as  sacrifice.  But  a  human  offence  could  not  possi- 
bly be  expiated  by  that  means.  They  have  imposed  upon 
themselves  grievous  performances,  as  wearisome  pilgrim- 
ages, or  painful  tortures,  e.  g.,  by  scourgings.  But  also 
these  do  not  change  the  heart,  and  therefore  before  God  can 
have  no  worth.  The  atonement  for  a  misdeed  could  obvi- 
ously consist  only  in  the  man's  earnestly  bearing,  in  humble 
acknowledgment  of  God's  righteousness,  the  evils  which 
fall  from  that  righteousness  upon  the  misdoer  as  the  reward 
of  the  misdeed ;  secondly,  in  his  utterly  breaking  with  the 
evil  disposition  from  which  his  evil  deeds  proceed  ;  thirdly, 
in  his  leading  from  this  time  forth  a  righteous  life.  Where, 
now,  are  the  men  who  are  able  to  do  this  ?  —  and  indeed  do 
it  before  they  have  the  Holy  Spirit?  For  this  can  be  given 
to  man  only  after  the  expiation  has  occurred.  There  may, 
it  is  true,  be  many  who  imagine  they  are  fully  able  to  com- 
ply with  that  threefold  requirement,  and  thus  to  become 
their  own  expiators.  But  this  is  a  self-delusion.  These 
men  know  not  that  there  is  a  law  of  sin  ;  that  sin  is  like  a 
revolving  wheel  which  turns  round  with  itself  every  one 
who  becomes  entangled  in  it.  Our  great  poets  know  well 
of  this  revolving  wheel.  How  powerfully  Shakespeare  speaks 
of  it !  But  let  us  not  in  this  connection  think  of  merely 
such  monstrous  offenders  as  Macbeth  and  his  consort.  To 
be  selfish  is  to  be  sinful.  Whether  the  evil  dwelling  in  man 
makes  its  appearance  in  great  or  small  dimensions,  in  ugly 
and  rough,  or  in  seemly  and  polished  forms,  is  a  secondary 
matter.  Ugly  animals,  when  through  the  diminutiveness 
of  their  figure  their  ugliness  hides  itself  from  the  human 
eye,  are  on  that  account  not  less  ugly ;  he  who  arms  his 
eye  with  a  microscope  is  shocked  at  their  ugliness.     Before 


THE    SCRIPTURAL   DOCTRINE   OF   ATONEMENT       265 

God's  eye,  however,  everything  stands  as  it  really  is. 
Even  this  is  a  secondary  consideration,  whether  the  evil 
comes  to  be  action,  or  remains  locked  up  in  the  heart. 
God  looks  at  the  heart.  Before  his  eye,  a  very  real  murder 
can  be  committed  by  mere  thought.  Even  the  selfishness 
remaining  concealed  in  the  depths  of  the  heart  is  a  govern- 
ess over  man  ;  he  can  at  the  best  hinder  it  from  manifesting 
itself  by  word  and  work ;  but  he  cannot  expel  it  from  his 
heart. 

I  am  speaking  here  of  such  men  as  have  not  yet  the 
Holy  Spirit.  To  me  it  seems  that  it  must  now  be  clear 
that  no  man  can  himself  atone  for  his  sin.  And  yet  an  atone- 
ment for  our  sin  is  necessary.  Accordingly  we  have  now 
come  to  the  point  from  which  we  can  begin  to  understand 
the  appearance  of  Jesus  on  our  behalf.  The  eternal  "Word 
of  God  is  in  Jesus  become  flesh,  a  complete  real  man. 
N'ow  as  Jesus,  sinless  but  truly  human,  truly  human  but 
sinless,  grew  up  in  Nazareth,  he  must  soon  have  learned, 
by  contact  with  those  who  met  him,  that  none  of  them 
stood  to  God  as  he  stood  to  him.  To  Jesus  intercourse 
with  God  was  as  necessary  for  his  soul-life  as  was  the 
breathing  of  the  air  or  the  seeing  of  the  light  for  his  physi- 
cal life.  Moreover,  he  nowhere  found  a  separation  between 
God  and  himself.  To  pray  and  do  the  will  of  God  was 
his  delight.  His  inmost  consciousness  told  him  that  he 
was  God's  child  and  God  was  his  Father.  With  men  in 
the  society  about  him  he  also  found,  indeed,  a  need  for 
God,  but  neither  this  constancy  of  seeking  for  God,  nor 
this  child-intercourse  with  him.  As  the  boy  became  a 
j^outh,  and  his  look  extended  to  his  people,  and  as  through 
the  reading  of  the  Old  Testament  the  history  of  his  people 
and  a  part  of  general  history  became  known  to  him,  the 
universality  of  human  sin,  and  how  entirely  destitute  of  the 


266  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

Spirit  from  God  humanity  was,  came  more  and  more 
forcibly  before  him.  Farther ;  we  can  regard  it  as  certain, 
that  in  the  same  measure  in  which  Jesus  began  to  come  to 
this  knowledge,  his  prayer-intercourse  with  his  Father  be- 
came an  intercession  for  his  Nazareth,  for  his  Israel,  for 
humanity  ;  for  living  intercourse  with  God  becomes  neces- 
sarily prayer,  and  true  prayer  becomes  necessarily  interces- 
sion. No  less  certain,  however,  is  it,  that  Jesus  must  soon 
have  perceived  how  mere  intercession  could  not  suffice  to 
save  his  people  and  humanity.  Even  the  Old  Testament 
law,  then  also  the  Old  Testament  prophecy,  pointed  to  the 
necessity  of  the  atonement.  Humanity  is  restored  to  life 
only  by  the  Spirit  from  God  ;  the  Spirit  from  God  it  receives 
only  when  an  atonement  for  its  sin  has  previously  been 
made.  The  intercession  of  Jesus  became,  then,  the  prayer 
that  the  Father  would  accept  him  as  the  Atoner  for  his 
brothers.  For  where  was  there  a  holy  one,  save  him?  And 
only  one  who  is  holy  can  become  an  atoner.  But  how  did 
he  wish  to  bring  about  the  atonement?  "To  atone  for" 
is  actually  to  take  back  the  misdeed  committed,  actually  to 
plead  for  the  pardon  of  it,  actually  to  break  the  staff  over 
it.  This  Jesus  wished  to  do  in  the  name  of  his  brothers. 
But  in  what  manner  could  he  do  it?  If  he  set  his  entire 
strength  on  attesting  God  to  his  brothers  and  leading  them 
back  to  him ;  if  he  was  willing  to  endure  all  sacrifices  on 
account  of  this  attestation  of  God  ;  if,  in  the  midst  of  this 
labor  with  sinners,  he  experienced  also  all  the  misery  which 
the  righteousness  of  God  attached  to  their  sin,  but  bowed 
his  soul  willingly  under  it,  because  where  sin  reigned  for 
the  sake  of  God's  righteousness  misery  also  must  reign,  — 
if  he  did  all  this,  and  did  it  till  the  last  breath  of  his  life, 
is  not  this  so  to  interpose  in  the  process  of  the  holy  God 
towards  sinful  humanity  that  he,  in  the  name  of  his  brothers, 


THE    SCRIPTURAL   DOCTRINE    OF   ATONEMENT        267 

laid  before  the  throne  of  God  an  actual  acknowledgment 
of  the  perfect  wrong  of  man  and  of  the  perfect  right  of  God, 
and  an  actual  plea  for  the  pardon  of  our  misdeed  ? 

To  become  in  such  a  way  our  advocate  was  the  resolu- 
tion with  which  the  holy  Jesus  came  from  Nazareth  to  the 
Jordan.  Many  readers  of  the  Gospels  have  wondered  that 
our  Lord  began  his  public  ministry  by  suffering  himself  to 
be  baptized  by  John ;  for  this  baptism  was  usually  con- 
nected with  the  confession  of  sin.  The  immersion  was  in 
itself  a  sj^mbol  of  the  desire  to  wash  away  the  defilement 
of  the  soul.  Jesus,  however,  was,  as  he  not  merely  once, 
but  one  would  be  authorized  in  saying  a  hundred  times 
attested,  without  the  least  impurity.  Wherefore,  then,  with 
him  the  water  baptism?  The  matter  explains  itself  by 
what  he  subsequently  said  of  the  baptism  of  suffering  w^hich 
was  to  be  accomplished  in  him.  It  was  the  willingness  to 
this  that  he  symbolically  expressed  in  his  participation  in 
the  Jordan  baptism.  He  who  alone  of  all  men  had  no  part 
in  human  sin  desired,  nevertheless,  to  take  part  in  human 
sufferings,  which  are  the  wages  of  sin,  in  order  thus  to 
become  helpful  to  sinners.  This  willingness  he  confessed 
by  his  baptism,  and  his  Father  accepted  this  confession. 

Three  times  in  the  life  of  our  Lord  a  voice  came  from 
heaven  attesting  that  his  Father  was  well  pleased  with  him, 
and  each  time  it  was  occasioned  by  an  attestation  of  Jesus 
of  his  willingness  to  suffer.  The  first  instance  is  this  at 
his  baptism.  The  evangelists  relate  that  as  Jesus  went  up 
from  the  water  a  voice  came  from  heaven,  saj'iug,  "  This  is 
my  beloved  Son,  in  whom  I  am  well  pleased."  The  second 
voice  from  heaven  occurred  in  connection  with  the  trans- 
figuration of  Jesus  on  the  mountain.  This  took  place  six 
days  after  Jesus  had  given  to  his  disciples,  when  near 
Caesarea,  that    solemn    announcement   of   his   impending 


268  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

death,  which  we  mentioned  at  the  beginning.  Again  the 
voice  sounded,  "  This  is  my  beloved  Son,  in  whom  I  am 
well  pleased."  This  voice,  as  well  as  the  whole  trans- 
figuration on  that  mountain,  stood  in  intimate  relation  to 
the  announcement  made  by  Jesus  of  his  suffering.  Jesus 
humbles  himself  before  his  disciples  to  the  confession  that 
he,  the  Messiah,  will  be  abased  even  to  an  ignominious 
death ;  the  Father  glorifies  him  b}^  the  breaking  forth  of 
the  inwardly  concealed  glory  of  Jesus  in  his  outward  ap- 
pearance, then  by  the  coming  of  Moses  and  Elias,  and, 
lastly,  hy  that  voice  from  heaven.  Jesus  is  by  this  trans- 
figuration recognized  as  one  belonging  to  the  heavenly 
world,  who,  when  on  earth  he  dies,  dies  not  as  a  man 
naturally  subject  to  death,  but  as  the  shepherd  who,  out  of 
love  to  the  flock,  voluntarily  suffers  death.  The  third 
instance  took  place  after  Jesus'  formal  entry  into  Jerusa- 
lem, a  few  days  before  his  death.  The  thought  of  the 
approaching  death  had,  as  John  narrates  in  the  twelfth 
chapter,  at  that  time  suddenly  filled  Jesus  with  deep  hor- 
ror. He  cries  out,  "  Now  is  my  soul  troubled."  He  asks 
himself  whether  he  shall  pray  the  Father  to  save  him  from 
this  hour  of  anguish.  But  as  he  is  willing  to  bear  death 
itself,  so  is  he  willing  to  endure  also  this  anguish  and  the 
humiliation,  before  those  about  him,  connected  therewith, 
if  only  the  name  of  his  Father  will  be  glorified  by  him. 
Then,  once  more,  comes  the  voice  from  heaven.  It 
attests  that,  as  Jesus'  life  up  to  that  time  had  been,  so  will 
also  his  impending  death  be,  simply  the  glorification  of 
God.-^  These  were  assurances  of  the  Father  how  well 
pleasing  to  him  was  Jesus'  willingness  to  suffer.  But  we 
can  likewise  understand  by  these  voices  from  heaven,  with 
which   the   Father   answered  Jesus'  willingness  to  suffer, 

'  Luke  12 :  50 ;  Matt.  3 :  17 ;  17 :  5 ;  John  12 :  27  f. 


THE    SCRIPTURAL    DOCTRINE    OF   ATONEMENT        269 

how  severe  was  the  suffering  of  Jesus.  These  encourage- 
ments which  he  received  from  above  give  us  a  look  into 
the  depths  of  his  conflict. 

It  must  not,  moreover,  be  supposed  that  Jesus'  suffering 
first  commenced  in  the  last  week  ;  it  extended  through  his 
whole  life,  especiall}^  through  its  last  year.  If  the  question 
is  asked  wherein,  then,  it  consisted,  three  ingredients  come 
particularly  under  consideration.  First,  what  befell  him  from 
the  hatred  of  men.  How  disdainfully  he  was  often  treated  ! 
A  servant  of  the  devil  he  must  suffer  himself  to  be  called 
in  reproach.  But  not  merely  the  enmity  of  men  did  Jesus 
have  to  endure.  His  heavenly  Father  put  him  to  a  severe 
trial  also  by  often  concealing  from  him  his  presence  and 
love.  Jesus'  whole  life  was  a  walking  by  faith.  Ever 
anew  it  was  necessary  to  break  through  obscurities.  This 
concealment  of  the  Father  reached  its  height  precisely 
when  the  enmity  of  men  became  the  greatest.  Whoever 
of  us  leads  his  life  far  from  God  ought  justly  to  confess  his 
unfitness  to  judge  in  any  degree  of  the  mystery  of  the  life 
of  Jesus.  Even  the  life  of  a  pious  man,  as,  e.  g.,  of  a 
Luther,  and  especially  its  deepest  kernel,  remains  neces- 
sarity  an  enigma  to  him  who  is  remote  from  God,  for,  nat- 
urally, only  like  can  understand  like ;  how  much  more, 
then,  must  the  life  of  the  only  begotten  Son  of  God  remain 
a  mystery  to  him  !  On  the  contrary,  those  to  whom  an  inti- 
mate intercourse  with  God  is  a  felt  necessity  will  find  it 
intelligible,  that,  with  Jesus,  the  higher  the  enmity  of  men 
rose,  the  greater  became  the  desire  of  the  soul  for  the  in- 
ternal experience  of  fellowship  with  the  Father.  Instead 
of  that,  precisely  in  his  outwardly  most  trying  hours, 
namel3^  in  Gethsemane,  when  he  knew  the  arrest  was  nigh, 
and,  above  all,  on  the  cross,  when  the  derision  of  his  ene- 
mies  and   his   physical   distress  had  become  greatest,  the 


270  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

iDternal  fellowship  with  the  Father  was  concealed,  the 
inner  A^oice,  assuring  him  of  his  being  the  beloved  Son,  was 
silent,  so  that  Jesus,  who  was  always  the  perfectly  true, 
could  not  do  otherwise  than  break  out  before  his  revilers  in 
the  cry  of  humiliation,  "  My  God,  ray  God,  why  hast  thou 
forsaken  me  !  "  And  now  came  death  itself,  death  which, 
according  to  the  universal  testimony  of  the  Scripture  of 
the  Old  and  New  Testaments,  is  the  wages  of  sin,  and, 
consequently,  for  the  holy  Jesus  was  an  experience  that 
militated  against  his  nature. 

So  fiery  were  the  trials  in  which  Jesus  had  to  prove 
the  earnestness  of  his  zeal  for  the  honor  of  God,  and  of  his 
commiseration  with  sinners,  of  his  intercession  on  their  be- 
half. The  sinless  Jesus  had  to  share  wholly  the  lot  of  sin- 
ners. Men  treated  him  as  though  he  was  the  most  odious 
of  criminals,  and  God  preserved  him  not  from  this  mistreat- 
ment ;  he  delivered  him  up  to  their  hatred  ;  he  was  silent ; 
he  delivered  him  up  to  death.  So  fully  had  Jesus  to  expe- 
rience the  consequences  of  having  to  do  with  sinners,  of 
wishing  and  purposing  to  save  them  ;  he,  the  Holy  One,  had 
to  taste  the  entire  curse  which  through  sin  has  come  upon 
humanity,  as  though  he  himself  was  a  sinner.  He,  how- 
ever, remained  a  willing  sufferer.  He  despised  not  the  con- 
dition under  which  alone  he  could  interest  himself  in  sin- 
ners, namely,  becoming  involved  in  the  curse  resting  upon 
our  race.  He  knew  that  this  curse  lay  upon  our  race  justly  ; 
that  it  was  the  retributive  justice  of  God  that  imposed  it 
on  us  ;  and  since  he  willingly  suffered  the  whole  lot  of  those 
whom  he  wished  to  help  as  his  brothers,  he  has  actually 
acknowledged  the  righteousness  of  God  and  the  execrable- 
ness  of  human  sin.  By  just  this  has  he  become  our  expi- 
ator.  The  expiation  of  sin  must  take  place  by  tie  actual 
acknowledgment  that  it  is  purely  and  perfectly  wrong,  ancf 


THE   SCRIPTURAL   DOCTRINE   OP   ATONEMENT       271 

that  God,  in  the  decreeing  of  all  the  misery  in  soul  and 
body  wherewith  he  requites  our  sin,  is  in  the  right.  By 
such  an  acknowledgment  the  majesty  of  God,  ignored  by 
sinners,  is  satisfied.  Jesus  has  in  the  name  of  humanity 
pronounced  the  verdict  upon  human  sin,  therefore  God  can 
forbear  to  judge  us. 

My  friends,  as  I  have  endeavored  to  open  a  look  into  the 
way  in  which  the  atonement  for  human  sin  was  effected  by 
the  Lord  Jesus,  I  am  far  from  supposing  that  by  what  has 
been  said  this  great  theme  has  been  exhaustively  discussed. 
One  thing,  however,  I  aflSrm  with  confidence,  that  even  this 
discussion  is  sufficient  to  show  how  superficial  are  the  objec- 
tions with  which  opponents  are  accustomed  to  load  the  doc- 
trine of  the  atonement.  "Where,  I  ask,  remains,  e.  g.,  the  dis- 
paragement of  God's  doing  injustice  to  Jesus,  if  it  was  the 
inmost  desire  of  Jesus  himself  to  be  permitted  to  appear 
for  his  brothers  as  their  priest?  Or  how  can  it  be  said, 
that,  according  to  the  doctrine  of  atonement  preached  in 
our  churches,  God  punishes  sin  first  in  Jesus  and  after- 
wards in  us  also?  Of  external  punishment,  with  which 
human  magistrates,  in  their  proceedings  against  the  trans- 
gressors of  civil  law,  must  content  themselves,  we  are  here 
not  speaking.  That  sinners  are  in  the  way  to  ruin  breaks 
forth  from  the  nature  of  the  case  itself  with  inner  neces- 
sity ;  for  he  who  separates  himself  from  the  living  God  by 
this  very  act  chooses  death.  "What,  however,  Jesus  suf- 
fered, he  suffered  because  the  free  constraint  of  his  love  im- 
pelled him  to  suffer  with  and  for  his  brethren.  As  little 
ought  a  thinking  man  to  say,  that,  according  to  this  doc- 
trine, God  asked  a  double  expiation  of  our  sins,  the  first  of 
us  sinners,  the  second  of  the  holy  Jesus.  For  in  the  mis- 
ery which  we  ourselves  through  sin  inflict  upon  ourselves 
can  be  no  expiation  ;  because  only  holy  suftering  is  an  expi- 


272  THE    BREMEN   LECTURES 

atory  suffering.  Our  suffering,  however,  is  an  unholy  suf« 
fering ;  the  holy  and  therefore  propitiatory  suffering  was  to 
be  found  with  Jesus  only. 

In  conclusion,  permit  me  yet  a  few  words  on  the  ques- 
tion, how  after  all  it  can  come  to  pass  that  Jesus'  atone- 
ment is  available  for  others,  for  humanity,  for  every  one 
of  us.  He  who  would  understand  this  must  make  clear  to 
himself  two  things.  First,  the  being  of  the  expiator, 
Christ.  Self-intelligible  is  it  that  Jesus,  if  he  was  himself 
a  sinner,  could  not  have  become  our  expiator ;  for  then  he 
would  have  needed  rather  himself  an  expiator.  But  not 
even  sinlessness  was  suflScient  to  qualify  him  to  make 
atonement.  Humanity  may  be  compared  to  a  tree.  Ordi- 
nary men  are,  then,  the  leaves.  Prominent  men,  who  form 
the  support  for  others,  are  like  the  twigs.  The  greatest 
among  men,  those  whose  spirit  influences  whole  nations 
and  generations,  as,  e.  g.,  a  Luther,  can  be  called  the 
boughs  of  the  tree.  But  the  tree  of  humanity  must  have 
also  trunk  and  root.  And  if  the  question  is  concerning  the 
representation  of  entire  humanity  before  God,  this  can  be 
done  only  by  a  man  who  could  be  designated  as  both  the 
trunk  and  the  root  of  humanity.  This  man,  according  to 
the  Scriptures,  was  Jesus  Christ.  For  he  is  the  Word  of 
God  become  flesh,  by  whom  and  for  whom  the  whole  world, 
and  so  also  humanity,  was  created.^  This  Word,  become 
flesh,  could  alone  be  the  representative  of  humanity.  He 
only  had  an  insight  into  the  entire  depth  of  human  sin, 
therefore  he  alone  could  treat  in  a  priestly  way  with  God 
respecting  it.  Jesus  only  could  be  sensible  of  the  whole, 
full  anguish  of  soul,  on  account  of  human  sin,  correspond- 
ing to  the  greatness  of  the  misdeed.  When  the  frivolous 
son  of  a  noble  father  does  a  grievous  crime,  with  whom  is 

iCol.l:15f.;  John  1:3. 


THE    SCRIPTURAL    DOCTRINE    OF   ATONEMENT        273' 

the  inner  anguish  afterward  the  greater,  with  the  son  or 
the  father?  According  to  experience,  with  the  father. 
This  will  help  us  to  understand  the  agony  of  Jesus  on 
account  of  the  sin  of  men,  for  Jesus  is  the  eternal  Son  of 
God  become  man,  by  whom  and  for  whom  we  were 
created ;  from  the  creation  we  have  been  his  possession. 
Yet  of  the  inner  being  of  Jesus  I  will  at  present  speak  no 
farther ;  it  formed  the  subject  of  an  earlier  lecture. 

The  other  thing  which  one  must  make  clear  to  himself,  to 
comprehend  the  availableness  of  the  atonement  of  Christ 
for  us,  is  the  nature  of  faith.  Only  for  the  believer  does 
the  atonement  of  Christ  avail.  That  to  a  great  many  men 
the  Christian  doctrine  of  the  reposing  of  our  happiness 
upon  the  righteousness  of  another,  namely,  of  Jesus  Christ, 
remains  unintelligible,  has  its  ground  principally  in  the 
fact  that  they  have  an  erroneous  conception  of  what  faith 
is.  They  conceive  that  faith  is  equivalent  to  assent. 
They  regard  faith  as  a  matter  of  the  head,  whereby  no 
change  takes  place  in  the  man  himself,  in  the  heart  of  the 
man.  It  is  no  wonder,  then,  if  such  persons  ask  with 
astonishment,  whether  this  accords  with  the  righteousness 
of  God,  that  a  foreign  righteousness  should  avail  as  our 
own.  Were  faith  in  Christ  nothing  but  an  assent  to  the 
fact  that  Christ  is  this  and  that,  and  that  his  death  has 
such  and  such  significancy,  then,  assuredly,  Christ  remains 
to  us  a  foreigner,  and  that  his  death  should  avail  for  us 
would  be  out  of  the  question.  But  the  faith  which  the 
Scriptures  call  justifying  and  saving  is  far  different  from  a 
mere  assent.  There  are,  it  must  be  confessed,  a  great 
many  Christians  who  hold  fast  to  a  dead  assent,  and 
esteem  themselves  believers  on  account  of  this  assent ;  but 
true  believers  have  always  protested,  and  will  never  cease 
to  protest,  against  this  error.     To  believe  in  the  crucified 


274  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

Christ  is,  rather,  to  make  his  expiatory  death  the  founda- 
tion upon  which  one  stands,  the  bread  on  which  the  soul 
I'eeds,  the  fountain  from  which  it  quenches  its  thirst ;  it  is 
to  hunger  and  thirst  after  righteousness,  and  j^et  to 
acknowledge  one's  own  unrighteousness  and  to  lay  hold  of 
Christ's  righteousness  and  with  the  whole  heart  to  rejoice 
in  Christ's  righteousness ;  it  is  with  the  whole  soul  to 
subscribe  for  one's  self  to  that  verdict  which  Christ,  by  his 
willing  suffering  of  our  death  with  us,  on  account  of  the 
sin  of  humanity,  has  pronounced ;  it  is  to  make,  with 
humble  and  yet  trustful  heart,  the  holy  plea  for  the  pardon 
of  human  guilt,  which  the  first-born  brother  has  offered  in 
the  name  of  his  brothers,  our  own  plea.  To  which  a 
second  element  must  be  added.  Christ,  the  same  Christ 
who  died  for  us,  has  risen,  lives  from  eternity  to  eternity, 
is  present  with  us,  dwells,  rules,  works  in  the  midst  of  us, 
accompanies  the  announcement  of  his  word  with  touchings 
of  our  souls  by  his  Spirit,  apprehends  our  souls,  —  and  if 
now  thy  soul  in  turn  apprehends  Him  who  apprehends  it, 
that  is  faith.  Or,  to  use  the  words  of  Luther  in  his  trea- 
tise on  the  freedom  of  a  Christian  man,  faith  unites  the 
soul  with  Christ  as  a  bride  is  united  with  her  bridegroom. 
The  assurance  is  nowadays  at  times  heard,  that  for  the 
Christian  faith  and  life  it  is  essentially  indifferent  whether 
Christ  has  risen  or  not.  That  is  about  as  though  one 
should  say,  it  is  for  marriage  indifferent  whether  the 
bridegroom  is  alive  or  not.  To  him,  however,  who  has 
once  understood  that  faith  is  a  living  apprehension  of  the 
living  Saviour,  it  is  by  just  that  understanding  rendered 
also  intelligible  how  Christ's  righteousness  can  avail  for 
the  believer.  Also  this  I  can  best  express  in  the  words  of 
Luther.  When  the  soul  has  by  faith  become  Christ's 
bride,  says  Luther,  "  then  to  both,  possessions,  hap,  mis- 


THE   SCRIPTURAL    DOCTRINE    OF    ATONEMENT        275 

hap,  and  all  things  become  common.  What  Christ  has,  is 
the  believing  soul's  ;  what  the  soul  has,  becomes  Christ's. 
If  Christ  has  all  possessions  and  blessedness,  they  become 
the  soul's.  If  the  soul  has  all  vice  and  sin  on  it,  they 
become  Christ's."  Even  so,  as  no  one  doubts,  that,  as 
soon  as  the  man-iage  is  conchided,  the  married  woman  can 
regard  all  the  propert}^  of  her  husband  as  her  own,  so  also 
this  can  by  no  deep  thinker  be  doubted,  that  he  who  by 
faith  is  in  Christ  and  Christ  in  him  is  entitled  to  call 
Christ's  righteousness  his  own.  And  experience  confirms 
this  right.  For  every  man  who  in  living  faith  lays  hold  of 
Christ  has  that  witness  in  himself  of  which  Paul,  in  Rom. 
8,  writes,  "The  Spirit  itself  beareth  witness  with  our 
spirit,  that  we  are  the  children  of  God."  Thus  it  has 
been  for  eighteen  centuries ;  thus  it  will  remain.  All 
events  of  the  deeper  soul-life,  indeed,  are  intelligible  only 
to  him  who  has  himself  experienced  them  ;  so  this  deepest 
experience  of  the  human  soul,  its  faith-union  with  Christ, 
will  remain  to  those  who  have  not  experienced  the  same 
unintelligible.  But  what  to  a  Paul  and  a  John,  what  to  a 
Luther  and  a  Calvin  was  the  most  blessed  experience,  we 
shall  all  do  well  to  endeavor  to  experience.  Therefore  let 
us  remember  that  word  which  our  Lord  spoke  to  the 
two  who  were  the  first  in  desiring  to  learn  to  know  him, 
after  the  Baptist,  pointing  to  Jesus,  had  cried,  "Behold  the 
Lamb  of  God,  which  taketh  away  the  sin  of  the  world  I " 
namely,  the  word,  "  Come  and  see." 


LECTURE   VIII 

THE  AUTHENTICITY  OF   OUR   GOSPELS 

By  CONSTANTIN  TISCHENDORF,  D.  D. 

PROFESSOR  OF  THEOLOGY  AT  LEIPSIC 


COXSTANTIN  TISCHEXDORF,  D.  D. 


BIOGEAPHICAX, 


Dr.  LoBEGOTT  Friedrich  Constantin  Tischendorf,  so  well- 
known  throughout  the  whole  Christian  world  for  his  vast  labors 
in  biblical  criticism  and  for  his  discovery  of  the  "  Codex  Sinaiti- 
cus,^'  was  born  at  Lengenfeld,  in  Saxony,  Jan.  18,  1815.  His 
father  was  the  village  physician  and  apothecary.  He  studied 
at  Plauen  and  Leipsic.  In  his  school  life  he  seems  to  have  been 
remarkable  for  his  diligence  and  poetical  gifts.  In  1836  he  took  a 
prize-medal  for  an  essay,  and  another  one  for  another  essay  in 
1838.  His  first  important  work  that  brought  him  into  notice,  was 
his  deciphering  and  publishing  at  Paris  (about  1843)  of  a  famous 
palimpsest,  the  '*  Codex  Ephraemi.''^  He  published  his  first  Greek 
Testament  in  1841,  the  eighth  large  and  critical  edition  of  which 
was  nearly  completed  at  the  time  of  his  death,  and  in  all 
twenty-two  editions  had  appeared  from  his  hand.  Another 
one  of  his  publications  that  has  a  wide  circulation,  is  his  little 
work  entitled  Wann  wurden  unsere  Evangelien  verfasst  f  This  was 
translated  into  English  and  a  large  number  of  other  languages. 
In  1844  Dr.  Tischendorf  made  his  first  journey  to  the  Orient, 
where,  in  the  convent  of  St.  Catharine,  on  Mount  Sinai,  he 
discovered  forty-three  leaves  of  the  *'  Codex  Sinaiticus.^'  But 
it  was  not  until  his  third  journey  to  the  same  convent,  in 
1859,  that  he  succeeded  in  finding  the  rest  of  that  important 
work  and  in  persuading  the  monks  of  the  convent  to  make 
a  present  of  the  manuscript  to  the  Czar  of  Russia.  Accordingly 
the  "  Codex  Sinaiticus^'  is  now  in  the  imperial  library  at  St. 
Petersburg,  although  Dr.  Tischendorf  published  three  editions 
of  it,  one  of  the  entire  work  and  two  of  the  New  Testament 
part  of  it,  and  thus  gave  this  codex  to  the  whole  literary  world. 
His  death  occurred  at  Leipsic,  where  he  was  a  professor,  in  1874. 


SUMMAEY  OF  LEOTTJEE  Vin 


The  authority  of  the  hfe  of  Jesus  depends  upon  the  authority 
or  genuineness  of  the  Gospels — The  evidence  of  this  genuine- 
ness may  be  divided  into  internal  and  external,  the  external  be- 
ing the  more  important — The  external  testimonies  may  be  clas- 
sified as  ecclesiastical,  heretical,  antagonistic,  and  apochryphal 
— Beginning  with  the  Irensean  age,  170-200,  we  find,  among  the 
oldest  external  testimonies,  the  two  earliest  translations  of  the 
Gospels,  the  oldest  Latin  and  the  oldest  Syriac — The  Muratori 
Catalogue  of  the  books  of  the  New  Testament  is  about  as  old 
(160) — About  the  same  time  appear  two  "Harmonies  of  the 
Gospels,"  one  by  Tatian  and  the  other  by  Theophilus — Justin 
Martyr's  ''Apology"  comes  next — The  Epistle  of  Barnabas  is 
also  a  testimony  of  canonical  rank — The  Ignatian  letters  carry 
us  up  to  a  still  earlier  period  (107  or  115) — The  testimony  of 
Polycarp  and  Papias  is  also  important— The  recently  discovered 
prologue  of  the  Gospel  of  John,  and  Irenseus'  quotation  from 
Papias,  may  finish  these  ecclesiastical  testimonies — Of  the  heret- 
ical evidences,  the  doctrinal  system  of  Valentine,  who  came  to 
Rome  about  140,  may  be  referred  to — Also  Ptolemy  and  Herac- 
leon,  disciples  of  Valentine,  are  witnesses — Basilides  carries  us 
still  [further  back — Marcion  (came  to  Rome  before  140)  recog- 
nized, according  to  Tertullian,  all  the  four  Gospels,  especially 
that  of  John — Of  the  antagonistic  testimonies,  the  polemical 
treatise  of  Celsus,  as  quoted  by  Origen,  is  most  important — Two 
writings  belonging  to  the  apochryphal  testimony  may  be  ad- 
duced, the  ''Testaments  of  the  Twelve  Patriarchs"  and  the 
"Acts  of  Pilate" — ^The  result  of  all  these  testimonies  is  to  show 
that  between  140  and  110  the  four  Gospels  were  received 
throughout  Christendom  in  general,  and  their  canonical  rank 
was  acknowledged — As  to  the  internal  evidences  it  may  be  af- 
firmed that  although  there  are  differences  in  the  accounts  of  the 
four  evangelists,  these  differences  are  far  from  being  contradic- 
tions. 


vm 

TEE  AUTHENTICITY  OF  OUR  GOSPELS 
BY   CONSrrAJSrrVlN  TISCHElNDORir',   T>,  i>^ 

PROFESSOR     OF     THEOLOGY     AT     LEIP8IC 

^■^bb^IIE  life  of  Jesus  has  become  in  Christian  science 
II  \  the  great  question  of  the  day.  And  this  question 
'■^^J^  engages  the  attention  not  only  of  professors, 
ecclesiastics,  and  other  men,  whose  position  brings 
them  nearer  to  theological  science  ;  by  no  means,  —  the  in- 
terest of  it  is  shared  also  by  the  church,  by  the  whole 
Christian  world.  Whence  this  interest,  this  significance 
of  the  question  ?  That  can  be  told  without  difficulty.  For 
on  the  answer  to  the  question,  What  must  be  said  of  the 
life  of  Jesus  ?  depends  in  a  very  particular  sense  Christianity 
and  the  church,  our  faith,  our  salvation.  But  on  what  does 
the  answering  of  the  momentous  question  itself  depend? 
The  sources  from  which  we  derive  the  life  of  Jesus  are  our 
Gospels.  On  the  nature  of  these  sources,  on  their  reliable- 
ness, their  authority,  therefore,  depends  especially  the  life 
of  Jesus,  depends  the  authority  of  the  evangelical  life  of 
Jesus.  Are  our  Gospels  authentic  or  are  they  unauthen- 
tic ?  —  so  more  definitely  runs  the  question  on  whose 
answering  the  authority  of  the  Gospels,  and  consequently 
also  the  authority  of  the  life  of  Jesus,  which  they  contain, 

is  dependent.    Let  me,  then,  enter  at  once  upon  the  ex- 

281 


282  THE   BREMEN   LECTURES 

amination,  upon  the  answering  of  this  question,  though 
in  the  compass  of  an  hour  no  full  argument  can  be  at- 
tempted. 

The  authenticity  of  the  Gospels  being  disputed,  our  task 
is  to  search  for  proofs  or  evidences  that  they  are  authentic. 
These  evidences  are  often  divided  into  those  which  are 
external  and  those  which  are  internal.  The  internal  evi- 
dences have  to  do  with  the  contents  themselves  of  the 
Gospels.  Accordingly,  the  opponents  of  the  authenticity 
of  these  sacred  narratives  have  designated  many  peculi- 
arities of  one  or  the  other  of  them,  individual  details  or 
passages,  as  incongruous  with  the  character  of  the  author. 
It  has,  for  example,  been  said  that  the  form  of  expression 
repeatedly  used  in  the  fourth  Gospel,  "  The  disciple  whom 
Jesus  loved,"  does  not  favor  the  view  that  John,  who  is  to 
be  understood  by  this  disciple,  composed  the  Gospel.  To 
others,  and  myself  among  the  number,  this  form  of  expres- 
sion shows  precisely  the  opposite.  There  is  a  peculiar 
delicacy  in  the  evangelist's  being  content  to  make  himself 
known  by  such  an  intimation.  How  could  the  like  have 
occurred  to  the  mind  of  a  forger,  of  a  pseudo-John?  I 
mention  this  instance  only  to  remark,  that  manifoldly  the 
so-called  internal  evidences  are  made  to  conform  to  our 
opinions,  nay,  to  our  tastes,  so  that  they  can  prove  to  one 
the  contrary  to  what  another  finds  in  them.  Entirely  dif- 
ferent is  it  with  the  external  evidences.  They  rest  upon 
facts  which  force  themselves  on  us  even  against  our  will, 
which  necessitate  by  their  own  weight  a  recognition  of 
themselves,  and  that  though  modern  skepticism  questions 
even  what  is  best  established.  It  is  easy  to  comprehend 
why,  from  the  apologetic  point  of  view,  the  external  evi- 
dences are  sought  for  by  way  of  preference.     It  is  because 


THE    AUTHENTICITY    OF    OUR    GOSPELS  283 

they,  far  more  than  the  internal,  are  bej^ond  the  reach  of 
skeptical  caprice. 

We  shall,  therefore,  ourselves  first  of  all  notice  the  ex- 
ternal testimonies  to  the  authenticity  of  the  Gospels. 
Where  are  they?  We  have  to  search  for  them  in  the 
earliest  Christian  literature,  in  those  writings  which  fol- 
lowed near  to,  and  some  of  them  almost  in  connection  with, 
the  apostolic  evangelical  narratives.  If  in  this  literature 
we  find  traces  of  the  existence  and  of  the  authority  of  the 
Gospels,  then  in  them  we  have  the  proof  of  the  Gospels* 
authenticity ;  for  they  prove  their  highest  age  and  early 
repute  in  the  church.  Of  far  less  consequence  would  it  be, 
did  such  traces  fail  us ;  for  it  is  conceivable  that  much 
might  have  been  written  in  Christendom  without  any  direct 
reference  to  the  letter  of  the  Gospels. 

The  literature  to  whose  examination  our  attention  is  now 
to  be  given  we  divide  into  four  classes :  the  ecclesiastical^ 
the  heretical,  the  antagonistic,  and  the  apocryphal.  The 
ecclesiastical  is  that  which  belongs  to  the  faith  and  the 
bosom  of  the  church  itself.  The  heretical  we  can  term 
also  that  of  false  teachers,  of  those  errorists  who,  indeed, 
subscribed  to  Christianit}-,  but  at  the  same  time  adhered  to 
their  old  philosophical  ideas  imported  from  heathenism  or 
Judaism,  and  sought  to  blend  them  with  Christianity.  The 
third  class  embraces  those  writings  which  originated  with 
different  opponents  of  the  Christian  church.  The  apoc- 
r3^phal  books  of  the  New  Testament,  lastly,  are  writings 
which  treat  New  Testament  material  arbitrarily  and  under 
the  names  of  persons  falsely  represented  as  their  authors. 

Commencing,  then,  with  the  earliest  ecclesiastical  litera- 
ture, we  will  take,  as  our  point  of  departure,  that  of  the 
Irenaean  age,  which  may  be  located  at  perhaps  from  170  to 
200  (Irenaeus,  Bishop  of  Lyons,  from  177  to  202),  because 


284  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

at  that  time  our  four  Gospels  ruled  so  generally  and  un- 
qualifiedly in  the  church  that  even  those  learned  men  of  to- 
day whom  we  must  call  opponents  of  the  Gospels'  author- 
ity start  from  that  point  for  their  purposes.  On  the  other 
hand,  the  immediately  preceding  decades  of  years  cannot 
be  thus  passed  over.  Through  these  we  are  led,  as  could 
be  suflaciently  shown,  —  uncertainty  being  connected  with 
only  one  or  two  decades  of  years,  —  by  the  two  earliest 
translations  of  the  Gospels,  the  oldest  Latin  and  the  oldest 
Syriac.^  The  former  originated  in  Proconsular  Africa, 
somewhere  near  modern  Tunis ;  the  latter  in  the  country  on 
the  Euphrates.  The  two  versions,  to  leave  out  of  view  the 
individual  differences  of  the  text,  contain  already  precisely 
our  four  Gospels,  —  a  circumstance  which  necessarily  sup- 
poses the  authority  of  these  same  writings  in  the  mother 
church,  which  used  the  original  Greek  text.  At  the  same 
time,  perhaps  about  the  year  160,  was  composed  a  cata- 
logue of  the  books  of  the  New  Testament,  which  in  princi- 
pal part  was  discovered  by  a  learned  Italian  of  the  past 
century,  by  the  name  of  Muratori.  In  this  catalogue  the 
four  Gospels  are  found,  as  in  our  customary  order,  at  the 
head .2  Lastly,  not  far  from  this  same  period,  two  writings, 
to  be  described  as  "  Harmonies  of  the  Gospels,"  make  their 
appearance,  the  one  from  the  hand  of  Tatian,  Justin's  (about 
165)  disciple,  the  other  by  Theophilus,  before  180,  Bishop 
of  Antioch  in  Syria.  The  two  works  being  designed  to 
combine  the  four  descriptions  of  the  life  of  Jesus  into  one, 
could  have  been  produced  only  after  the  quaternary  number 
of  the  Gospels  was  completely  recognized  in  the  church. 

1  The  version  discovered  some  twenty  years  since,  in  the  British  Museum;  it  was 
presupposed  by  the  so-called  Peschito. 

8  To  be  sure,  the  first  part  of  the  fragment  is  lost  j  but  since  the  Gospel  of  Luke 
Is  given  as  the  third,  that  of  John  as  the  fourth  Gospel,  unquestionably  aa  the 
first  and  second  the  Gospels  of  Matthew  and  Mark  preceded. 


THE    AUTHENTICITY    OF    OUR    GOSPELS  28o 

But  we  go  back  at  once  to  Justin  Martyr,  whose  chief 
writing,  with  which  we  have  particular^  to  do,  a  defence 
of  Christianity^  addressed  to  Antoninus  Pius,  is  very  justly 
assigned  to  the  year  138  or  139.  In  this  book,  as  is  con- 
ceded, use  has  been  made  of  the  first  three  Gospels,  at 
least  of  Matthew.  As  to  the  emploj^ment  of  John,  on 
which  most  depends,  some  learned  men  have  expressed 
doubt.  To  me  it  seems  unquestionable  that  Justin  used 
John  also.  While  this  is  shown  by  the  many  passages  in 
which  Justin  emplo^^s  John's  peculiar  designation  of  the 
Saviour  as  the  Word  of  God,  it  appears  with  especial  obvi- 
ousness from  a  passage  in  the  sixty-first  chapter  of  his 
Apology.  Here  Justin  writes,  "  Christ  has  said.  Except  ye 
are  born  again,  ye  cannot  enter  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven  ; 
but  that  it  is  impossible  that  they  who  are  once  bom  should 
enter  a  second  time  into  their  mother's  womb  and  be  born, 
is  clear  to  every  one."  This  expression  must  have  been  de- 
rived from  John  3  :  3-5,  where  to  the  words  of  Jesus  on 
the  second  or  new  birth  Nicodemus  replies,  "  How  can  a 
man  be  born  when  he  is  old?  can  he  enter  the  second 
time  into  his  mother's  womb  and  be  born  ?  "  It  would  be 
inexplicable,  should  any  one  wish  to  raise  such  an  objection 
as  this,  that  the  form  of  expression  here  used  might  acci- 
dentally occur  in  the  writings  of  both  John  and  Justin. 
And  wholly  unwarranted  is  the  reference  of  this  passage  in 
Justm  to  Matthew  18  :  3,  —  "  Verily  I  say  unto  you,  ex- 
cept ye  be  converted  and  become  as  little  children,  ye  shall 
not  enter  into  the  kingdom  of  heaven." 

Still  another  item  from  Justin  I  must  use  for  our  purpose. 
Justin  tells  us  in  the  same  Apology  that  the  Memoirs  of 
the  Apostles,  "  called  Gospels,"  or  the  Writin^^s  of  the 
Prophets,  were  read  every  Lord's  day  in  the  assemblies  of 
the  Christians.     This  proves  incontrovertibly  that  already 


286  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

at  that  day  the  Gospels  were  recognized  as  equally  canon- 
ical with  the  Old  Testament.  That  by  these  Gospels  only 
our  four,  neither  more  nor  less,  are  to  be  understood,  is  just 
as  certain. 

For  one  such  attestation  of  the  canonical  rank  of  these 
books  of  the  New  Testament  we  are  indebted  to  the 
Epistle  of  Barnabas.  But  this  production  is  older  by  some 
twenty  years  than  Justin's  Apology,  since,  at  the  very 
latest,  it  cannot  have  been  written  subsequently  to  from 
110  to  120.  Here  we  read  in  the  fourth  chapter  the  words, 
"  Let  us,  therefore,  take  care  lest  we  be  found  among  those 
of  whom  it  is  written  that  many  were  called,  but  few 
chosen."  That  by  this  Matt.  22  :  14  (For  many  are  called, 
but  few  chosen) ,  is  referred  to,  every  one  perceives  at  once ; 
also,  that  it  is  an  utterly  fanciful  shift  to  bring  forward  in 
place  of  Matthew  the  words  in  the  fourth  book  of  Ezra, 
''  For  many  are  born,  but  few  shall  be  saved."  Perhaps, 
however,  you  will  ask,  what  is  there  in  this  reference  that 
authorizes  us  to  conclude  upon  the  canonical  rank  of  the 
Gospels  as  recognized  at  the  time  when  Barnabas  wrote 
his  epistle  ?  We  are  not  only  authorized,  but  required  to 
do  so  by  the  expression,  "It  is  written."  This  is  the 
classical  phrase  by  which  the  canonical  writings  of  the 
Old  Testament  were  indicated.  Who  does  not  remember 
that  it  frequently  proceeded  from  the  Saviour's  own  mouth  ? 
As  soon  as  it  was  applied  to  the  New  Testament  Scrip- 
tures, a  New  Testament  canon  sprang  up  side  by  side  with 
that  of  the  Old  Testament.  Just  on  this  account  many 
doubted  that  these  important  words  were  written  by  the 
author  of  the  epistle,  so  long  as  only  an  old  Latin  trans- 
lation, and  not  the  original  text  itself,  of  the  passage  lay 
before  us.  But,  fortunately,  the  original  text  has  been 
found.     It  was  discovered  ten  years  ago   in   the   ancient 


THE    AUTHENTICITY    OF    OUR    GOSPELS  287 

manuscript  of  the  Sinaitic  Bible.  This  decides  that  the 
expression,  "  It  is  written,"  belongs  to  the  author  of  the 
epistle  himself.  Nor  can  it  be  objected,  that  the  inference 
resulting  from  this  decision  must  be  limited  to  the  Gospel 
of  Matthew.  No,  it  applies  to  all  four  Gospels  ;  for  there 
is  not  the  least  probabilitj^  that  one  of  the  Gospels  was 
regarded  as  canonical  while  the  others  were  not  so  re- 
ceived. 

Up  to  a  still  earlier  period  Ignatius  caiTies  us ;  for  he 
wrote  in  either  107  or  115.  Of  the  thi-ee  different  versions 
still  extant  of  his  letters,  we  must,  for  reasons  sujOadently 
given  in  the  texts  themselves,  assign  the  first  rank  to  the 
so-called  middle  one,  which  consists  of  six  letters.  Be- 
sides, this  version  is  supported  even  by  the  testimony  of 
Eusebius  (died  340),  and  by  that  which  is  still  about  two 
centuries  older,  the  testimony  of  Polycarp.  In  these 
letters,  which  Ignatius  composed  on  his  journey  from 
Antioch  to  his  martyrdom  at  Rome,  may  be  found  (in  the 
seventh  chapter  of  his  letter  to  the  Romans)  as  follows : 
"I  desire  the  bread  of  God,  the  bread  of  heaven,  the  bread 
of  life,  which  is  the  flesh  of  Jesus  Christ,  the  Son  of  God. 
And  I  desire  the  drink  of  God,  the  blood  of  Jesus  Christ, 
who  is  undying  love  and  eternal  life."  Are  these,  also, 
accidental  expressions  which  an3'body  might  have  hit 
upon?  No,  thej^  are  an  unmistakable  reference  to  John 
6:  41,  et  seq.,  where  it  is  said,  "I  am  the  bread  which 
came  down  from  heaven.  I  am  the  bread  of  life.  Tlie 
bread  that  I  will  give  is  my  flesh.  TVhoso  eateth  my  flesh, 
and  drinketh  my  blood,  hath  eternal  life."  It  would  be 
strange  if  testimonial  force  were  attributable  to  only  a 
strictly  verbal  reference.  Precisely  in  this  instance  an 
exact  verbalism  was  wholly  aside  from  the  purpose ; 
besides,  such   exactness   of  quotation   was    certainly  not 


288  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

needed,  that  the  readers  might  be  reminded  ah-ectly  of 
Ignatius*  leaning  here  upon  the  evangelical  narrative  of 
John,  whose  disciple  he  was,  as  well  as  of  his  having  in 
the  same  letter  (chapter  six)  undoubtedl}^  had  in  view  a 
passage  in  Matthew. 

Immediately  after  Ignatius*  death  the  letter  of  Polycarp 
bears  testimony  to  the  first  Epistle  of  John,  as  already 
Eusebius  remarked.  But  that  a  testimony  to  the  epistle  is* 
also  one  to  the  gospel,  since  the  two  writings  must  have 
had  the  same  author,  can  only  be  questioned  by  a  spirit  of 
contradiction  which  is  inimical  to  the  truth. 

And  a  testimony  similar  to  that  of  Polycarp  is  borne  by 
Papias  in  the  five  books  of  his  expositions  of  the  prophecies 
of  the  Lord,  according  to  the  statement  of  Eusebius.  To 
!ihis  we  may  add  the  prologue  to  the  Gospel  of  John,  re- 
cently brought  to  light,  which  a  Latin  manuscript  of  the 
Gospels  in  the  Vatican  library,  a  manuscript  of  the  ninth 
century,  has  drawn  from  a  source  at  all  events  much  older. 
In  this  we  read,  "The  Gospel  of  John  was  written  and 
delivered  to  the  church  while  John  was  yet  alive  and  by 
this  apostle  himself,  as  Papias  of  Hierapolis  has  recorded 
in  his  five  books."  The  appeal  very  uncritically  made  to 
the  silence  of  Papias  respecting  the  same  Gospel  in  the 
account  of  him  given  by  Eusebius,  who  on  his  part  had 
not  the  remotest  thought  of  furnishing  ancient  testimonies 
to  any  of  the  four  Gospels,  is  thus  converted  into  its  com- 
plete opposite.  But  we  must  not  here  forget  the  earliest 
testimony  of  all  to  the  much  suspected  John,  the  testimony 
which  Irenaeus  (v.  36,  2)  extracted,  as  the  connection 
shows,  from  this  same  book  of  Papias.  No  less  important 
witnesses  than  the  highest  authorities  of  Papias,  his  "  most 
ancient  presbyters,"  who  touched  upon  the  rank  of  the 
apostles,  depose  this  evidence,  "  Therefore,  say  they,  the 


THE   AUTHENTICITY    OF    OUR   GOSPELS  289 

Lord  uttered  the  word,  In  my  Father's  house  are  many 
mansions."  This  we  have  on  the  authority  of  Irenseus,  in 
whose  work  until  but  recently  the  passage  was  unaccount- 
ably overlooked. 

These  then  are  testimonies  to  our  Gospels  from  the  very 
bosom  of  the  church.  Their  force  as  argument  is  so  great 
that  it  can  hardly  be  exceeded.  Still  it  is  of  real  impor- 
tance to  see  the  result  we  have  gained  on  all  sides  con- 
firmed. Let  us  therefore,  according  to  our  announcement, 
now  pass  to  the  heretics.  What  Irenseus  says  of  them, 
"  So  well  established  are  our  Gospels  that  even  teachers 
of  error  themselves  bear  testimony  to  them  ;  even  they  rest 
their  objections  upon  the  foundation  of  the  Gospels,"  — this 
we  can  still  to-day  most  satisfactorily  prove.  First  of  all 
by  the  procedure  of  Valentine,  who  came  from  Egypt  to 
Rome  about  140.  Notwithstanding  the  extreme  arbitra- 
riness of  his  doctrinal  system,  he  appears  according  to 
Irenaeus,  as  according  to  Hippolytus,  Irenseus'  disciple,  to 
have  depended  decidedly  on  passages  from  the  first  three, 
the  so-called  Synoptic  Gospels,  and  still  more  on  John. 
Expressions  such  as  the  Only-begotten,  the  Word,  Life, 
Light,  Fulness,  Truth,  Grace,  the  Redeemer,  the  Comforter, 
pervade  his  entire  scheme  ;  besides,  there  are  not  wanting 
sentences  which  he  has  quoted  literally  and  used  in  his 
sense.  It  is  purely  arbitrary  and  uncritical  to  suppose 
that  on  the  part  of  the  vouchers  named  there  was  in  this 
matter  a  confounding  of  Valentine  with  the  Valentinians, 
nis  disciples  and  adherents.  But  it  is  true  that  the  disciples 
follow  their  master's  example,  and  corroborate  the  view 
that  it  appeared  to  Valentine  an  important  matter  to  prove, 
even  though  it  must  be  in  the  most  artificial  and  forced 
way,  the  unison  of  his  system  with  the  Gospels,  —  es- 
pecially with  that  of  John,  —  as  the  holy,  standard-giving, 


290  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

primitive  writings  of  the  church.  This  applies  particularly 
to  the  two  most  distinguished  disciples  of  Valentine, 
Ptolemy  and  Heracleon,  the  latter  of  whom  wrote  an  entire 
commentary  on  the  Johannine  Gospel,  of  which  Origen  has 
preserved  for  us  several  fragments. ^ 

Still  farther  back,  to  pass  over  all  other  heretics  of  this 
period,  we  find  Basilides.  He  belonged,  according  to  Euse- 
bius,  to  Hadrian's  age  (117-138),  and  he  also  himself  pre- 
tended to  have  received  from  Matthias,  who  was  chosen  to 
fill  the  traitor's  place  in  the  apostolate,  certain  secret  doc- 
trines. Basilides  wrote,  as  Agrippa  Castor,  one  of  his 
contemporaries,  tells  us,  twenty-four  books  of  commentary 
on  the  Evangel,  under  which  name  the  four  Gospels  were 
comprised  in  the  second  century.  Moreover,  Hippolytus 
points  out  several  citations  made  by  Basilides  from  our 
Gospels,  two  of  which  are  from  John.  To  destroy  the 
force  of  this  latter  fact  no  artifice  was  left  but  the  one 
employed  in  the  instance  of  Valentine,  —  to  substitute  for 
Basilides  himself,  notwithstanding  that  Hippolytus  dis- 
tinctly names  him,  the  Basilidians. 

We  must  in  this  place  refer  yet  briefly  to  Marcion,  who 
before  140  came  from  Sinope  on  the  Black  Sea  to  Rome. 
In  conformity  with  his  antichristian  prejudice  against  Juda- 

1  On  the  age  of  Heracleon  comp.  the  4th  ed.  of  my  little  work,  "  Wann  \nirden 
unsere  Evangelien  verfasst  ? "  (  VThen  were  our  Gospels  written  ?  Translation 
of  let  ed.  published  by  Am.  Tract  Soc.)  p.  48.  There  it  is  remarked,  "  This  ques- 
tion (How  old  is  Heracleon  ?)  has  been  used  as  the  masterpiece  of  modern  false- 
hood invoked  against  Sacred  Literature ;  and  with  unbelieving  frivolousness  it  has 
been  anawered,  He  was  the  contemporary  of  Origen  and  Hippolytus."  After 
Rich.  Adalb.  Lipsius  had  in  three  places  of  his  pamphlet,  "  Zur  Quellenkritik  des 
Epiphanios  "  (1865),  laid  particular  stress  on  the  assertion  that  Heracleon  was  noi 
known  at  all  yet  by  Irenaeus,  Volckmar,  Scholten,  and  others  seized  so  confidently 
npon  it,  that  they  assigned  htm  to  the  end  of  the  second  century.  But  the  name 
of  Heracleon  is  wanting  only  in  the  index  to  Irenaeus'  work ;  in  the  book  itself  it 
stands  triumphant  against  the  tendency  theory  of  cutting  down  the  ages  of  the 
witnesses. 


THE    AUTHENTICITY    OF    OUR    GOSPELS  291 

ism,  he  rejected  several  of  the  New  Testament  writings,  as 
well  as  mutilated  and  altered  those  he  received.  Tertul- 
lian,  however,  attests  in  several  passages  of  his  book  against 
Marcion  expressly,  by  appeal  to  an  earlier  work  of  the 
latter,  that  he  originally  had  recognized  all  our  Gospels, 
and  particularly  that  of  John.  To  overturn  this  assertion, 
some  have  not  shunned  to  accuse  TertuUian  of  having 
falsely  imposed  upon  Marcion  a  knowledge  of  our  Gospels, 
—  an  accusation  which  would  be  incomparably  better 
suited  to  many  learned  professors  of  the  present  day  than 
to  that  serious-minded,  venerable  zealot. 

To  the  erroneous  teachers  we  add  a  bitter,  jeering  enemy 
of  the  church,  by  name  Celsus.  His  work  against  Chris- 
tianity Origen  has  refuted  at  length,  and  so  made  the 
substance  of  it  known  to  after  ages.  In  this  production 
Celsus  first  brought  forward  against  the  founder  of  our 
religion,  and  against  Mary,  Jewish  calumnies.  Then  he  de- 
clares he  will  now  restrict  himself  exclusively  to  the 
Christians'  own  writings,  to  the  "  writings  of  the  disciples 
of  Jesus."  This  he  did  obviously  for  the  reason  that  these 
writings  were  regarded  by  the  church  as  of  the  highest  au- 
thority. And  he  seizes  upon  passages  from  John  as  well 
as  from  the  other  Gospels.  This  even  the  impugners  of 
our  Gospels  admit.  Therefore  some  of  them  have  declared 
against  the  commonly  accepted  age  of  Celsus,  but  by  so 
doing  have  only  made  it  a  witness  to  the  feebleness  of  their 
own  position.^  Origen  says,  in  the  first  book  of  his  refuta- 
tion, that  Celsus  had  been  "  dead  a  long  while,"  and  places 
him  under  "  Hadrian  (117-138)  and  later."  This  statement 
weighs  more  in  the  scale  of  honest  reason  than  the  vague 
suppositions  of  modern  times.     Absolutely  nothing  can  be 

1  Comp.,  on  this  point,  "  Wann  warden  unsere  Evangelien  verfaBSt  ?  "    4th  ed.  p. 
73  flf.,  and  p.  x.,  f. 


292  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

discovered  which  is  sufficient  to  disprove  that  Celsus  lived 
about  the  middle  of  the  second  century.  And  so  it  is  cer- 
tainly of  some  importance  that  we  have  evidence  from  this 
period,  given  by  an  open  enemy  of  Christianity,  in  favor  of 
the  highest  esteem  of  our  Gospels  then  in  the  church. 

Of  the  Apocrj^phal  literature,  lastly,  I  will  refer  to  but 
two  writings.  One  of  them  bears  the  title,  Testaments  of 
the  Twelve  Patriarchs ;  the  other.  Acts  of  Pilate.  In  the 
former,  which  cannot  have  been  composed  later  than  about 
the  beginning  of  the  second  century,  our  Gospels,  especially 
John,  as  well  as  other  portions  of  the  New  Testament,  are 
presupposed.  The  other,  which  likewise  came  evidently 
from  a  Jewish-Christian  hand,  and  indeed  was  designed  to 
make  the  Jewish  authorities,  as  well  as  Pilate,  give  evidence 
for  the  divinity  of  Christ,  follows  especially  the  Gospel  of 
John  in  its  representation  of  the  proceedings  at  the  trial  of' 
the  Lord  and  of  his  death,  though  with  the  greatest  free- 
dom as  to  particulars.  Already  Justin,  in  his  Apology  to 
the  Emperor,  —  139,  —  cites  this  production  as  a  generally 
received  fragment  of  Acts.  It  must,  therefore,  at  that  time 
have  been  long  extant,  and  have  enjoyed  peculiar  respect 
among  Christians.  Inasmuch,  however,  as  it  supposes  the 
Gospel  of  John  more  than  the  others,  it  requires  the  hypoth- 
esis that  the  former  must  have  been  already  in  existence  about 
the  end  of  the  first  century.  As  to  the  originality  of  the  text 
of  the  Acts  of  Pilate  still  obtainable,  notwithstanding  all 
that  may  be  alleged  against  it,  I  hold  it  to  be  fully  credible 
that  this  same  text  goes  back  in  the  main  to  the  very 
ancient  form  used  by  Justin. 

And  now  what  is  the  result  of  our  research  in  the  earli- 
est Christian  literature  ?  It  is  this,  —  that  already,  between 
110  and  140,  our  Gospels  permeate  and  rule  the  entire 
church  and  its  writings.     All  lives  and  moves   in   them. 


THE   AUTHENTICITY    OF    OUR   GOSPELS  293 

Another  fact  attested  expressly  by  Justin,  as  also  by  the 
Epistle  of  Barnabas,  is  that  already  in  that  day  the  canon- 
ical rank  of  the  Gospels  was  recognized  by  the  church. 
At  what  point  of  time  and  in  what  way  this  exaltation, 
this  canonization,  of  the  Gospels  may  have  taken  place,  — 
on  these  points  we  have  no  definite  information.  But  the 
Gospels  were  born  authorities,  and  the  recognition  of  them 
as  of  equal  rank  with  the  books  of  the  Old  Testament 
eventuated  at  the  right  time  as  it  were  of  itself.  Or  did 
the  Gospel  of  John,  to  select  an  instance,  as  it  went  forth 
from  Ephesus,  need  first  an  ecclesiastical  decree?  If  it 
came  from  that  city  immediately  authenticated  by  the  apos- 
tolic church,  could  any  one  have  entertained  a  doubt  regard- 
ing its  origin,  regarding  its  authenticity?  But  if  it  pro- 
ceeded not  from  Ephesus,  who  in  the  world  could  have  been 
persuaded  that  it  was  the  work  of  John  at  Ephesus?  After 
the  centre  of  the  Israelitish  worship,  Jerusalem  and  its  tem- 
ple, had  fallen,  the  emancipation  of  the  church  from  the 
synagogue  was  complete.  And  after,  with  the  death  of 
John,  the  last  immediate  disciple  and  apostle  of  the  Lord 
was  taken  from  the  young  church,  and  this  church  was  dis- 
persed everywhere,  threatened  and  persecuted  b}^  enemies 
without  and  visited  bj^  different  tendencies  and  dissensions 
within,  then  arose  the  most  urgent  need  of  finding  in  the 
Gospels,  these  sacred  legacies  to  the  community  of  believ- 
ers, a  succedaneum  for  the  departed  eye-witnesses  of  the 
life  of  Jesus,  as  also  an  authoritative  rule  of  faith  and 
practice  for  the  church,  that  is,  of  elevating  them  to  equal 
canonical  rank  with  the  sacred  books  which  had  passed  over 
from  the  synagogue  to  the  church. 

But  what,  then,  shall  we  say  respecting  the  eflforts  of 
those  who  impugn  the  authority  of  the  Gospels,  whose  cry 
of  victory  is  based  upon  precisely  the  opposite  results  to 


294  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

ours?  Are  they  vanquished?  Oh,  there  always  remains 
a  convenient  method  of  reply,  a  A^ery  ready  way  of  parry- 
ing all  our  results.  It  is  by  casting  suspicion  upon  all 
that  the  church  and  science  have  hitherto  regarded  as  in- 
controvertibly  established  as  to  the  history  of  the  second 
century ;  it  is  by  substituting  for  a  sound  an  unsound 
historical  investigation,  by  setting  in  the  place  of  genuine 
science  skeptical  arbitrariness,  criticism  falsely  so-called. 
A  feature  or  two  of  this  criticism  we  have  already  indi- 
cated. At  one  time  it  is  denied,  in  spite  of  the  greatest 
obviousness,  that  a  Gospel  quotation  is  made  ;  at  another, 
recourse  is  had  for  help  to  lost  documents ;  one  of  these 
would-be  critics  rejects  entire  writings  as  ungenuine  be- 
cause not  suited  to  his  preconceptions,  or,  at  least,  decides 
that  those  very  passages  on  which  the  question  turns  have 
been  interpolated ;  another  represents  the  witnesses  as 
younger  than  they  are  ;  still  another  reverses  the  relations, 
as,  for  example,  the  author  of  the  fourth  Gospel  has  been 
made  to  borrow  from  Justin  or  from  Valentine ;  in  short, 
everything  is  undertaken  that  flight  from  the  truth  sug- 
gests. Now  to  all  this  no  word  seems  more  suited  than 
that  of  Paul  in  his  Epistle  to  the  Romans  (1  :  22),  "Pro- 
fessing themselves  to  be  wise  they  became  fools."  ^ 

1  Many  particulars,  here  only  hastily  touched,  or  even  wholly  passed  by,  have 
been  more  thoroughly  treated  in  the  author's  writing,  "Wann  wurden  unsere 
Evangelien  verfasst  ?  "  Leipsic,  4th  ed.,  1866,  Ist  ed.,  1865.  The  translations  of  it, 
in  their  different  fonns,  English,  French,  Italian,  Dutch,  Swedish,  Russian,  have 
appeared  in  thirteen  different  editions.  But  also  treatises  and  extended  articles 
against  it,  in  German,  French,  English,  Dutch,  have  not  been  wanting.  They  are 
noticed  in  part  in  the  Leipsic  edition.  Unnoticed  remains  the  Hollander  Scholten's 
treatise,  "Die  altesten  Zeugnisse,"  which  appeared  in  Bremen,  rendered  into 
German  by  an  ecclesiastic  of  that  city,  and  has  been  commonly  announced  by 
booksellers  as  "  Scholten  contra  Tischendorf."  There  is  nothing  in  it  that  could 
occasion  the  least  change  in  my  conviction.  How  fully  it  belongs  to  the  old 
rationalistic  and  the  so-called  Tiibingen  stand-point  the  Hollander  Hofstede  de 
G  root  has  admirably  shown  in  the  German  edition  (Leipsic,  1868)  of  his  apologetic 
writing,  "  Basilides." 


THE    AUTHENTICITY    OF    OUR    GOSPELS  295 

However,  we  have  not  yet  fully  solved  our  problem. 
For,  besides  the  external  evidences,  we  set  before  us  the 
examination  of  those  which  are  internal.  At  least  some- 
thing from  this  wide  field  must  not  be  wanting  to  our 
present  discourse. 

I  mention,  to  begin  with,  an  item  which  occupies,  as  it 
were,  an  intermediate  position  between  the  external  and 
the  internal  evidences.  In  it,  it  has  been  imagined  a 
historical  testimony  was  discovered  against  the  fourth 
Gospel.  John  celebrated  the  Christian  eucharist  with  the 
churches  of  Asia  Minor  on  the  14th  of  Nisan ;  in  the 
fourth  Gospel,  however,  it  is  stated  that  on  the  14th  of 
Nisan  Christ  died  on  the  cross,  while  according  to  the  first 
three  Gospels  Jesus  ate,  with  his  disciples  at  the  same  time, 
the  paschal  lamb  in  connection  with  the  institution  of  the 
supper.  Does  not  the  feast  custom  of  John,  therefore, 
contradict  the  fourth  Gospel?  Not  in  the  least.  The 
alleged  contradiction  rests  on  the  assumption  that  the 
Christian  eucharist  was  joined,  so  to  express  one's  self, 
on  to  the  day  of  the  institution  of  the  Lord's  Supper. 
But  this  supper  appears  rather,  according  to  the  teaching 
of  Paul,  that  Christ  is  our  passover  who  was  sacrificed  for 
us  (1  Cor.  5  :  7),  to  have  been  linked  with  the  day  of  the 
death  of  Christ,  as  the  true  paschal  lamb.  It  is  the  same 
with  many  other  objections. 

However,  the  assertion  is  not  incorrect,  that  one  evan- 
gelist gives  this,  another  that.  In  Luke  the  birth  of  Jesus 
is  announced  to  Mary,  in  Matthew  to  Joseph.  The  ac- 
counts of  Peter's  denials  vary.  Of  the  events  at  the  cru- 
cifixion one  Gospel  narrates  what  the  other  does  not.  The 
same  is  true  of  the  appearances  of  the  risen  Saviour. 
Generally,  however,  we  miss  in  John  very  much  that  the 
other  evangelists  have  recorded.     The  explanation  of  these 


296  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

differences  is  to  be  found,  first  of  all,  in  the  fragmentarj; 
character  of  our  Gospels.  It  was  not  the  intention  of  any 
one  of  the  evangelists  to  compose  a  regular  biography  of 
Jesus.  That  in  Jesus  of  Nazareth  the  Christ  of  the  Lord 
had  appeared,  —  this  they  all  bring  out  in  their  biographical 
sketches,  each  according  to  his  peculiar  design.  More- 
over, many  of  these  divergencies  are  far  from  being  con- 
tradictions. And,  for  the  right  understanding  of  the  fourth 
Gospel,  it  is  peculiarly  necessary  to  assume  that  John 
wrote  with  a  full  knowledge  of  the  three  earlier  composed 
Gospels,  and  that  not  the  least  governing  principle  in  his 
work  was  the  supplementing  of  these.  The  oldest  intelli- 
gence we  have,  which  is  a  tradition  preserved  by  Eusebius, 
respecting  the  composition  of  John's  Gospel,  supports  this 
view.  It  is  of  not  a  little  interest,  though  a  process  very 
greatly  abused,  to  trace  out  the  various  particulars  in  this 
Gospel  which  allude  to  that  relation. 

Another  specification  brought  forward  is  the  great 
difference  which  a  comparison  of  the  first  three  Gospels 
with  the  fourth  reveals  in  the  teachings  of  Jesus.  There 
we  have  the  simple  parables,  here  the  long  abstruse  dis- 
courses. But  cannot  this  difference  be  easily  explained? 
The  parables  were  addressed  to  the  common  people  of 
Galilee ;  they  were  the  popular  element  in  Jesus'  instruc- 
tion ;  they  most  readily  impressed  themselves  upon,  and 
certainly  were  especially  retained  in,  the  memory.  That 
they  are  found  in  the  very  foreground  of  the  Synoptic 
Gospels  harmonizes  with  the  entire  character  of  these 
Gospels.  John,  on  the  other  hand,  represents  the  Saviour 
chiefly  in  his  intercourse  at  Jerusalem  with  the  Pharisees 
and  scribes.  The  discourses  which  he  communicates  lived 
in  his  personal  i-emembrance  ;  they  are  by  no  means  of 
such  an  order  that  any  one  could  so  easily  have  delivered 


THE   AUTHENTICITY    OF    OUR    GOSPELS  297 

them.  And,  after  all,  is  it  not  the  same  spirit  that  rules 
in  both  kinds  of  teaching?  Rules  there  not  in  both  a 
striving  to  lead  from  the  near  at  hand,  the  natural,  the 
simple,  up  to  the  spiritual,  the  high,  the  heavenly?  John 
gives  us  the  discourses  on  the  bread  of  life,  on  the  living 
water,  concerning  the  good  shepherd,  about  the  true  vine  ; 
does  not  all  this  agree  with  the  parables?  Besides,  are 
not  the  long  discourses  found  in  the  Synoptic  Gospels,  as 
in  John,  shortly  before  the  last  great  events?  and,  in  turn, 
are  there  not  many  of  the  Synoptists'  expressions  to  be 
discovered  also  in  John  ? 

But  particular  stress  is  laid  upon  this, —  that  the  person 
of  the  Saviour  itself  appears  different  in  the  narrative  of 
John  from  the  representations  given  of  Jesus  by  the  other 
evangelists.  The  latter  portray  him  as  the  Son  of  man ; 
John  makes  him  to  be  the  Son  of  God.  As  an  objection  to 
the  credibility  of  our  Gospels,  this  criticism  has  wholly 
failed.  And  as  complete  a  failure  is  the  supposition  thai 
in  this  designation  is  presented  a  foreign  appropriation 
made  by  the  author  of  the  fourth  Gospel.  It  is  true,  the 
use  of  the  two  designations  was  dependent  upon  the 
educational  purpose  which  the  Lord  must  have  had  in  view 
with  regard  to  his  disciples  and  to  the  people.  But  even 
in  respect  to  his  person  the  most  complete  harmony  is 
revealed  in  the  different  representations.  To  be  sure,  with 
John  the  designation  of  Jesiis  as  the  Son  of  God  especially 
rules  ;  but  this  forms  the  necessary  basis  for  the  character- 
istic representations  of  the  Synoptics.  How  otherwise 
shall  we  understand  such  expressions  occurring  in  the 
latter  as  these:  "He  that  loveth  father  or  mother  more 
than  me  is  not  worthy  of  me  ;  "  "  All  things  are  delivered 
unto  me  of  my  Father ;  and  no  man  knoweth  the  Son,  but 
the  Father  ;  neither  knoweth  any  man  the  Father,  save  the 


298  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

Son,  and  he  to  whomsoever  the  Son  will  reveal  him  ;  " 
"  Not  every  one  that  saith  unto  me,  Lord,  Lord,  shall  enter 
into  the  kingdom  of  heaven;"  "Whosoever  shall  confess 
me  before  men,  him  will  I  confess  also  before  my  Father 
which  is  in  heaven  "  ?  Is  not  this  in  perfect  accord  with 
John's  representations  of  the  Son  of  God,  as,  e.  g.,  when 
we  read,  "  He  that  believeth  on  the  Son  hath  everlasting 
life;"  "Who  convinceth  me  of  sin?"  "He  that  believeth 
not  is  condemned  already  ;  '*  "I  and  my  Father  are  one  "? 
Just  this  agreement  of  the  evangelists  on  the  divine  char- 
acter of  the  person  of  Christ,  notwithstanding  all  their 
many  differences  in  details,  is  of  the  greatest  consequence. 
And  observe  how  much  all  these  utterances  aim  at  the 
person  itself  of  the  Saviour.  Could  a  mortal  have  spoken 
thus  of  himself  without  committing  blasphemy?  I  know 
no  way  of  escape ;  if  Christ  was  not  what  he  claimed  to  be, 
the  Son  of  God,  then  he  spoke  with  blasphemous  audacity. 
And  how  far  from  the  representation,  common  to  all  the 
Gospels,  of  this  sublime,  heavenly  personality,  is  the 
thought  that  we  have  here  to  do  with  a  product  of  the  re- 
flection and  fancy  of  the  first  Christian  community.  To 
attempt  such  an  explanation  of  the  Gospels  is  to  wander 
off  into  the  realm  of  the  most  unintelligible.  It  is  an 
error  which  overleaps  the  bounds  of  both  the  possible  and 
the  wonderful. 

But  the  reply  will  be  made  to  me,  with  all  this  the  con- 
tradictions of  the  Gospels  are  not  solved.  That  such  are 
in  fact  presented,  though  many  have  been  arbitrarily  and 
erroneously  alleged,  I  do  not  deny.  On  the  other  hand,  I 
do  deny  that  the  credibility  of  the  Gospels,  so  far  as  the 
divine  person  of  the  Lord  and  his  divine  redemption  are 
concerned,  is  affected  by  them.  We  have,  of  course,  no 
right  to  affirm  a  mechanical  inspiration  of  the  evangelists 


THE    AUTHEXTICITY    OF    OUR    GOSPELS  299 

which  secures  against  every  error ;  the  character  of  the 
Gospels  itself  forbids  that.  The  evangelists  wrote  their 
books  from  human  points  of  view  and  under  human  re- 
lations ;  impenetrated  with  the  Divine  Spirit,  they  scien- 
tifically and  to  the  best  of  their  knowledge  drew  up  their 
records.  That  here  and  there  they  do  not  altogether  agree, 
proves  that  they  wrote  with  a  certain  independence  and  far 
from  all  artificialness.  Inasmuch  as  the  Sjmoptic  Gospels, 
after  which  came  John,  could  not  have  been  composed 
earlier  than  between  the  years  60  and  70  of  the  first  cen- 
tury, as  was  the  view  also  taken  by  Irenaeus,  who,  first  of 
the  church  fathers,  wrote  on  this  topic,  nothing  is  more 
intelligible  than  the  differences  we  find  in  many  of  the 
Gospel  narrations  as  to  each  other.  But  does  not  this 
leave  manifold  opportunity  for  doubt  ?  If  that  were  not 
so,  to  me  the  nature  of  faith  would  seem  to  be  injured. 
Would  faith  then  have  its  full  worth,  if  the  possibility  of 
doubt  were  wanting? 

The  faith  of  the  Scriptures  is  faith  in  the  Son  of  God. 
He  who  confesses  that  Jesus  is  the  Son  of  God,  God  dwells 
in  him  and  he  in  God.  To  this  declaration  of  John  (1  John 
4)  the  church  has  to  hold  fast.  No  other  than  the  faith 
of  the  Scriptures,  obviously,  can  apply  to  itself  the  promises 
of  the  Scriptures.  Salvation  is  promised  to  it.  It  must 
be  a  great  act  to  which  so  much  is  promised.  It  is  an  act 
of  God  himself;  for  that  is  implied  in  the  words  of  Christ, 
"  No  man  can  come  to  me,  except  the  Father  draw  him." 
And  it  is  an  act  of  our  own  hearts  ;  otherwise  it  could  not 
be  said,  "  He  that  believeth  not  is  condemned  already." 
The  most  learned  man  can  make  no  one  a  believer.  Faith 
must  be  the  innermost  product  of  the  heart;  it  must  be 
one's  own  property ;  only  from  within  can  proceed  the 
decision  in  the  most  important  concern  of  life.     This  de- 


300  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

cision  must,  however,  be  a  victory  over  all  motions  of 
doubt ;  and  the  more  we  have  to  overcome  doubt,  the  fuller 
and  the  stronger  becomes  our  faith.  With  this,  then,  the 
structure  of  our  Gospels  is  most  fully  in  harmony.  It  is 
not  an  accidental  make-up,  but  belongs  essentially  to  our 
stand-point,  to  our  need.  No  document  is  put  into  our 
hands  which  excludes  all  doubt,  which  from  its  own  nature 
convinces  everybody.  We  stand  to  the  Lord  rather  to-day 
as  did  the  Pharisees  who  referred  his  wonderful  works  to 
the  devil.  The  question  presents  itself,  whether  this  Phari- 
saic unbelief  is  not  after  all  worth  more  than  the  infidelity 
of  these  times,  which  resolves  the  Gospel  miracles  into  mist 
and  vapor. 

It  is  a  pernicious  error  of  the  times  to  pay  especial  hom- 
age to  the  spirit  of  negation  ;  as  though  apprehending  and 
recognizing  were  not  more  noble  than  misconstruing  and 
assailing.  Erudition,  indeed,  has  never  had  the  key  to  the 
kingdom  of  heaven.  "Blessed  are  the  poor  in  spirit." 
This  being  spiritually  poor  is  suited  to  man  and  woman, 
high  and  low,  learned  and  unlettered.  How  else  would  the 
Gospel  be  a  power  of  God  to  the  saving  of  all  who  believe 
in  it?  Unbelief  is  as  old  as  Christianity;  besides,  it  will 
never  die  out.  But  in  the  midst  of  the  world  of  unbelief 
there  is  a  large,  royal  band  of  those  who  believe.  Did  we 
wish  to  number  them  all,  the  heroes  of  faith,  from  John 
and  Paul  down,  we  should  find  many  whom  history  has 
recorded  among  the  foremost  representatives  of  our  race. 
The  Lord's  saying,  "  He  that  believeth  not  is  condemned 
already,"  will  to  the  end  of  days  retain  its  crushing  weight. 
Let  us,  therefore,  take  that  word  home  to  our  hearts  which 
the  Apostle  Paul  addressed  to  his  most  loved  church,  that 
at  Philippi,  "  Work  out  your  own  salvation  with  fear  and 
trembling." 


LECTURE  IX 

THE  IDEA  OF  THE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD 
AS  CONSUMMATED,  AND  WHAT  IT 
TELLS  US  REGARDING  HISTORICAL 
CHRISTIANITY 

By  J.  P.  LANGE,  D.  D. 

PROFESSOR  AT  BONN 


J.  p.  LAXGE,  D.  D. 


BIOGEAPHIOAX, 


Dr.  Johann  Peter  Lange,  the  great  Bible  commentator  and 
author  of  so  many  other  literary  works,  is  described  as  being 
small  of  stature,  with  a  benignant  face,  bright  eye,  and  vigorous 
constitution.  He  was  one  of  the  most  fertile  and  original  theo- 
logical writers  of  the  nineteenth  century.  He  was  born  on  a 
farm  in  the  parish  of  Sonnborn,  near  Elberfeld,  Prussia,  April 
10,  1802  ;  died  at  Bonn,  July  8,  1884.  After  attending  the  gym- 
nasium at  Diisseldorf,  he  entered  the  university  at  Bonn  in  1822. 
There  he  was  particularly  influenced  by  Professor  Nitzsch.  For 
a  year  after  leaving  the  university  he  was  pastoral  assistant  at 
Langenberg  to  Rev.  Emil  Krummacher,  brother  of  the  cele- 
brated Dr.  F.  W.  Krummacher.  Then  he  became  Reformed 
pastor  of  Wald  in  1826,  of  Langenberg  in  1828,  and  of  Duisberg 
in  1832.  While  at  the  last-named  place  he  attracted  attention 
by  his  brilliant  articles  in  Hengstenberg's  Kirchenzeitung,  by 
his  poems,  and  by  an  able  publication  upon  the  Saviour's  in- 
fancy. In  1841,  after  Strauss  had  been  prevented  from  taking 
his  professorship  of  theology  in  the  University  of  Ziirich,  Dr. 
Lange  was  called  to  this  position.  There  he  elaborated  his  ex- 
tensive work  on  the  life  of  Jesus,  which  was  a  reply  to  Strauss, 
and  being  widely  circulated  in  German  and  English,  had  a 
marked  effect  upon  the  large  subsequent  literature  on  this  topic. 
In  1854  Dr.  Lange  became  a  professor  at  Bonn,  and  in  1860  he 
was  made  consistorialrath.  His  great  Bibelwerk  he  planned  and 
superintended  himself,  engaging  some  twenty  different  scholars 
to  assist  in  the  literary  labor.  He  himself  wrote  the  commen- 
taries on  Matthew,  Mark,  John,  Romans,  Revelation,  Genesis, 
Exodus,  Leviticus,  Numbers,  Haggai,  Zechariah,  and  Malachi. 


SUMMAEY  OF  LEOTUEE  IX 


The  idea  of  the  kingdom  of  God  as  consummated  is  a  spiritual 
highland,  and  still  more  formidable  would  appear  our  under- 
taking to  draw  from  that  idea  conclusions  regarding  the  present 
times  and  the  ancient  foundations  of  that  kingdom — A  great, 
instructive,  corrective,  and  determinative  efficacy  is  contained 
in  a  look  to  the  ends  and  aims  of  life — Proposition  one:  The 
world  is  under  the  control  of  God — Proposition  two:  the  end 
which  God  has  in  view  regarding  the  world  is  the  establishment 
of  a  dominion  of  perfected,  free,  personal,  spiritual  beings, 
united  in  love — Proposition  three :  the  basis  of  the  world  at  the 
creation  must  have  been  a  plastic,  impelling  idea  ;  also,  in  the 
general  idea  of  creation  Christ  really  comes  before  Adam — 
Proposition  four :  The  Spirit,  which  overcomes  the  great  antag- 
onism between  the  rule  of  God  over  the  world  and  the  perfect 
freedom  of  souls,  presupposes  the  sacred  history  and  especially 
the  life  of  Christ— All  natural  life  unfolds  itself  in  harmonious 
antagonisms  ;  so  also  with  the  rich  historical  life  of  humanity 
as  the  basis  and  preliminary  condition  of  God's  kingdom — The 
antagonisms  in  history  preceding  Christianity  may  be  specified 
as  follows  :  the  individual,  the  psychological,  the  ethnological,  and 
the  economic — In  Christianity  the  individual  antagonism  perfects 
itself  in  the  organic,  the  psychological  in  the  allegorical,  the  eth- 
nological in  the  social,  and  the  economic  in  the  cosmical — There 
are  three  kingdoms  which  God  has  in  connection  with  our 
world  :  the  kingdom  of  power,  the  kingdom  of  grace,  and  the 
kingdom  of  glory — Order  of  the  moments  in  the  consummation 
of  the  divine  kingdom — At  last  heaven  and  earth  will  pass  away 
as  divided  life-districts,  to  come  together  in  the  appearance  of 
the  city  of  God — The  conclusions  to  be  drawn  from  this  consum- 
mation are  particularly  two,  one  concerning  the  superiority 
and  reign  of  spirit  over  matter,  and  the  other  concerning  a  re- 
construction of  our  present  ecclesiastical  social  life. 


IX 


THE  IDEA  OF  TEE  KINGDOM  OF  GOD  AS  CON- 
SUMMATED, AND  WHAT  IT  TELLS  US  REGARD- 
ING HISTORICAL   CHRISTIANITY 

BY  J.  p.  lL,AIsr&E,   D.  D., 

PROFESSOR   AT  BONN 

^^Jfc^HE  theme  of  discussion  which  I  have  the  honor  to 
// I  \  bring  before  you  has  been,  in  its  essential  thought, 
v^^/  suggested  to  me  by  your  honorable  committee.  In 
so  doing,  your  committee  has  required  of  both 
speaker  and  hearer  a  somewhat  formidable  undertaking. 
The  idea  of  the  kingdom  of  God  in  its  consummation  is 
unmistakably  a  spiritual  highland  ;  the  next  hour,  therefore, 
is  to  be  occupied  by  us  in  a  spiritual  mountain  ascent.  We 
cannot,  however,  deny,  that,  in  our  times,  the  physical  trav- 
ersing of  Alps  is  more  the  order  of  the  day  than  is  the 
spiritual.  Yet  this  reflection  will  not  disturb  a  select  audi- 
ence of  a  bold  northern  maritime  cit3\  More  suspicious 
might  a  second  task  appear  to  us,  which  the  honorable  com- 
mittee has  connected  with  our  first.  From  the  kingdom  of 
God  as  consummated,  i.  e.,  in  an}^  case,  from  the  idea  of 
the  farthest  and  highest  scope  of  our  Christian  faith,  from 

1  The  lecture  here  preseuted  was  delivered  at  Bremen  in  large  part  extempora- 
neously. Consequently,  it  accords  strictly  neither  with  the  original  sketch,  nor  with 
the  oral  discourse.  The  oral  discourse,  adapting  itself  to  time  and  place,  naturally 
touched  upon  many  matters  here  omitted,  especially  many  more  scientific  mo 
ments.  On  the  other  hand,  meditation  furnished  many  additions.  In  essential*, 
however,  the  present  rendering  fully  reproduces  the  Bremen  discourse. 

U  305 


306  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

the  still  greatly  concealed  consummation  of  the  still  con- 
cealed kingdom  of  God,  we  are  to  draw  conclusions  regard- 
ing present  times,  nay,  regarding  the  foundation  anciently 
laid  of  that  kingdom. 

And  yet  this  design,  seemingly  quite  too  bold,  is,  closely 
inspected,  a  truly  happy  thought.  The  question  of  the  goal 
of  life  diffuses,  wherever  it  is  earnestly  asked,  a  peculiar 
light  upon  the  ways  of  life  at  the  very  place  where  one  is 
standing.  The  immediate  consciousness  of  present  endow- 
ments is,  as  an  anticipation  of  the  future,  one  of  the  most 
potent  guiding  stars  of  life.  He  who  has  earnestly  fixed 
his  eyes  upon  the  true  object  of  his  life  will  surely  find  also 
the  right  way.  The  mother  bows  over  her  child  in  the 
cradle  with  the  thought,  he  is  to  become  a  good,  worthy 
man ;  this  heart-thought  becomes  the  light  of  the  nursery, 
the  tenor  of  the  maternal  prayers,  the  rule  of  the  child's 
education.  Above  all  things  else,  the  haven,  the  end  of 
the  journey,  is  had  in  view  by  the  mariner ;  and  from  this 
look  ahead  is  shaped  the  certainty  of  the  voyage  under  the 
motto,  Navigare  necesse  est,  vivere  non}  Just  so  Israel  by 
a  great  religio-ethical  look  forward  to  the  end  of  the  world's 
course  became  the  blessed  people  of  the  future,  and  would 
have  remained  the  first-born  among  the  nations,  had  it  kept 
its  forecast  untarnished.  There  is,  then,  in  the  look  to  the 
ends  and  aims  of  life  a  great  instructive,  corrective,  and 
determinative  eflScacy.  If  we  cannot  possibly  walk  togeth- 
er longer,  then  it  behooves  us  to  make  a  last  attempt  with 
the  question  of  the  unity  of  aims.  In  the  dispute  concern- 
ing the  ultimate  ends,  the  mere  exchanging  of  views  ceases  , 
here  the  ways  differ  and  divide  in  ethical  form.  Among 
them,  however,  are  distinguished,  with  respect  to  this  form, 

1  The  motto  of  the  Bremen  '■'■  Seefahrt,"  the  building  in  which  the  lecture  was 
riven. 


THE   KINGDOM    OF   GOD  307 

the  Hierarchical  and  the  Protestant  extremes ;  the  author 
of  the  Syllabus  pronounces  in  advance  all  views  dissenting 
from  his  system  godless,  while  the  absolute  protest,  i.  e., 
the  absolute  skepticism  of  the  second  degree,  in  the  livery 
of  thoughtlessness,  demands  that  even  the  most  radical 
negatives,  which  dissipate  all  the  common  religio-moral 
aims  of  humanity,  shall  be  urged  upon  the  conscience  of  no 
one.  According  to  the  first  extreme,  Christ  could  have 
said  to  the  tempter  in  the  wilderness,  perhaps  already  with 
the  first  temptation,  "  Get  thee  hence,  Satan  !  "  According  to 
the  latter  extreme,  he  should  have  answered  him  even  after 
the  third  and  last  temptation,  which  disclosed  his  devilish 
design  as  the  negation  of  all  real  aims  :  I  have  a  different 
view  on  that  point.  Christianity,  however,  in  the  question 
of  aims,  will  have  to  do  least  of  all  with  unseasonable  di- 
versions. Therefore,  the  Apostle  Peter,  the  same  who 
refuted  the  frivolous  judges  who  said  of  the  phenomena 
occurring  on  the  first  Whitsuntide,  "  These  men  are  full  of 
new  wine,"  with  the  quite  dispassionate  words,  "It  is  but 
the  third  hour  of  the  day"  (9  a.  m.),  —  the  same  has  char- 
acterized the  deniers  of  the  Christian  end  of  the  world,  who 
with  sweeping  rejection  say,  "  Where  is  the  promise  of  his 
coming?"  as  simply  scoffers  walking  after  their  own  lusts. 
The  justification  of  this  verdict,  however,  is  found  in  the 
self-contradiction  of  which  these  persons  are  guilty  who,  in 
the  concrete  apprehension  of  the  advent  of  the  Lord,  deny 
the  moral  aim  of  the  world.  While  they  deny  not  only  the 
specifically  Christian  teleology,  but  also  in  general  all  tele- 
ology, all  ends  and  ultimate  ends  in  the  world,  they  run  with 
excitement  and  passion  after  their  own  false  ends,  and  thus 
show  that  they  have  done  with  making  life  a  poor  jest.  As  it 
has  been  often  and  justly  remarked,  that  absolute  doubters 
refute  themselves,  since  they  make  of  doubt  a  great  tenet ; 


308  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

that  absolute  protestants  refute  themselves,  since  they  make 
the  setting  aside  of  all  dogmas  the  principal  dogma,  the 
abolition  of  all  confessions  the  modern  confession  ;  ^  so,  in 
an  eminent  degree,  this  holds  good  also  of  those  who  put 
before  them  the  particular  end  of  banishing  all  ends  from 
acknowledgment  in  the  world  of  thought  and  from  the 
reality  of  the  objective  world.  Thus  even  the  false  ends 
of  egotism  must  testify  to  the  inalienable  existence  of  the 
true  religio-moral  ends  grounded  in  the  world's  very  con- 
stitution. 

We  now  premise  at  once,  that  man  is  a  social  being ; 
that  mankind  is  a  unit,  and  that  this  unit  has  a  history,  — 
a  history,  which  is  above  that  of  nature,  entirely  distinct 
from  zoology  into  which  some  would  degrade  it,  a  regular 
development  from  a  definite  basis,  according  to  definite 
laws,  to  a  definite  end ;  that  is  the  end  of  the  world. 
But  can  we  now  go  farther  and  say.  The  end  of  the  world 
is  the  kingdom  of  God  in  its  consummation? 

Let  me  indicate  some  general  propositions,  the  truth  of 
which  we  must  assume  to  be  granted,  as  we  cannot  here 
discuss  them  without  going  aside  from  the  subject  immedi- 
ately in  hand, —  the  postulates,  then,  upon  which  our  affirma- 
tion rests,  Tlie  end  of  the  world  is  the  kingdom  of  God  in 
its  consummation. 

Proposition  one.  The  world  is  subject  to  God,  to  the 
true,  personal,  i.  e.,  eternally  self-conscious,  absolutely 
free  God,  who  is  love  itself.  Because  he  is  free  and 
spiritual,  he  has  created  and  upholds  the  world  as  corre- 
spondingly free  and  spiritual. 

Proposition  two.  The  end  which  this  God  has  in  view 
regarding  the  world  is  none  other  than  the  establishment 

*  Ab,  indeed,  even  the  negative  thinkers  in  Paris  style  themselves  Positiviets. 


THE   KINGDOM    OF   GOD  309 

of  a  dominion  under  his  own  government  of  perfected,  free, 
personal,  spiritual  beings  united  in  love. 

Proposition  three.  The  great  antagonism  which  exists 
between  the  absolute  rule  of  God  over  the  world  and  the 
perfect  freedom  of  souls,  and  exists  seemingly  as  a  contra- 
diction, will  be  eliminated  by  the  Spirit  of  God,  who 
desires  to  impart  himself  to  all,  so  as  to  unite  all. 

Proposition  four.  As  the  wind,  the  symbol  of  the 
Spirit,  is  not  an  empty  air-current  which  drives  restlessly 
through  the  empty  ether,  but  the  one,  agitated  life  of  the 
earth  which  relates  to  the  infinitely  fine  organism  of  the 
earth's  form,  so  the  Spirit  of  God,  who  establishes  the 
kingdom  of  God,  is  not  a  pseudo-spirit,  who  with  Indio- 
Brahmanical  jingle  of  phrases  about  spirit,  and  non-spirit, 
comes  whirling  in,  but  He  relates  to  the  one  organism  of 
mankind  and  to  his  revelation  in  the  essential  Word, 
hence  also  to  the  Head  of  this  organism,  the  one  concen- 
tration of  the  revealed  Word,  to  Christ.  The  other  Para- 
clete, it  is  therefore  said,  will  not  speak  of  himself,  but 
whatsoever  he  shall  hear,  that  shall  he  speak ;  he  presup- 
poses the  sacred  history. 

Accordingly  we  aflSrm  with  the  utmost  confidence.  The 
end  of  the  world  is  the  kingdom  of  God  as  consummated, 
i.e.,  the  full  actuality  of  the  human,  free,  spiritual  kingdom 
blessed  in  love,  —  a  kingdom  which  God  in  his  personal 
manifestation  in  Christ  has  founded,  founded  by  creation 
and  by  redemption,  to  perfect  it,  by  the  sanctifying  of  men, 
to  a  blessed  community  of  life  and  love  under  the  rule  of 
the  Word,  in  the  freedom  of  the  Spirit,  even  to  its  coming 
glorious  appearance. 

Still,  we  are  to  speak  not  merely  of  the  consummation 
of  this  kingdom,  but  also  of  the  value  of  its  idea  in  the 
explanation   of  the  relations   of   historical   Christianity. 


310  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

Yet  as  soon  as  we  approach  our  entire  problem,  we 
encounter  obstacles  which  must  be  removed  in  a  prelimi- 
nary wa}^,  to  wit,  modern  obscurations  of  all  the  founda- 
tions of  the  kingdom  of  God.  In  other  words,  we  shall 
have  to  ascend  gradually  through  the  hill-country  before 
we  come  to  the  highland  proper.  This  hill-country  is  the 
beautiful  riches  potentially  in  that  humanity  which  is 
destined  to  be  the  bride  of  Christ.  As  all  fulness  of  life, 
these  riches  spread  out  in  definite  antagonisms,  which  are 
each  the  exact  counterpart  of  the  other. 

We  shall  therefore  speak,  first,  of  the  bases  of  the 
kingdom  of  God  in  the  great  antagonisms  of  human  life ; 
secondl}^,  of  the  kingdom  of  God  itself  in  its  difi'erent 
fundamental  forms  as  related  to  the  form  of  its  consumma- 
tion ;  thirdly,  of  the  leading  questions  of  our  day  which 
from  this  luminous  goal  receive  their  proper  irradiation. 
Inasmuch  as  the  bases  of  the  kingdom  are,  in  the  first 
part,  to  be  set  in  the  light  over  against  modern  oblitera- 
tions, I  pray  you  not  to  regard  a  somewhat  protracted 
sojourn  in  this  division  as  delay. 

All  natural  life .  unfolds  itself  in  harmonious  antago- 
nisms ;  in  the  antagonism  of  form  and  matter ;  of  root  and 
top ;  of  male  and  female ;  of  soul  and  body.  Accord- 
ingly, the  rich  historical  life  of  humanity  also,  as  the  basis 
and  preliminary  condition  of  the  kingdom  of  God,  presents 
itself  in  a  fulness  of  antagonisms.  And  here  already  we 
must,  alas,  depose,  that  all  these  antagonisms,  and  there- 
fore also  all  these  questions,  antecedent  to  our  question,  are, 
without  exception,  injured,  yea,  manifoldly  obliterated,  by 
a  method  of  thought  which  boasts  of  being  modern,  albeit 
it  has  long  since  passed  through  its  old  and  musty  age  in 
ancient  India. 

Yet  we  shall  have  to  confess,  also,  that  an  extreme  ortho- 


THE   KINGDOM    OF   GOD  311 

doxy  has  shared  largely,  has  even  been  a  principal  in  the 
guilt  of  this  obliteration. 

As  such  antagonisms,  which  in  primitive  history  precede 
Christianity,  I  mention  the  individual,  the  jpsychologicoX,  the 
ethnological,  and  the  economic  antagonisms.  With  Christi- 
anity itself,  again,  four  new  antagonisms,  which,  indeed, 
previously  existed,  appear  with  perfected  definiteness,  in  a 
certain  measure,  as  the  higher  powers  of  the  first  antago- 
nisms. The  individual  antagonism  perfects  itself  in  the 
organic;  the  psychological  in  the  allegorical;  the  ethnologi- 
cal in  the  social;  the  economic  in  the  cosmical  antagonismA 

In  part  strange  designations  !  They  will,  however,  I 
trust,  become  intelligible  enough  by  the  elucidation,  —  per- 
haps will  seem  at  times  only  too  intelligible. 

By  the  individual  antagonism  I  understand,  that  with  the 
truthof  the  human  individuality,  accord mgr  to  which  man  is 
raised  above  the  conception  of  a  representative  of  his  genus, 
the  endless  dijQTerence  of  individualities  in  quantity  and 
quality  is  already  postulated,  and  then,  as  a  consequence 
thereof,  appears  also  in  the  great  antagonism  of  creative 
spirits  and  receptive  communities.  But  here  says  a  new 
religion-founder  of  the  latest  agitation  save  one,  "I  am  a 
man ;  about  me  are  men  ;  behind  me,  before  me,  mere 
men ;  Christ  was  also  a  man."  We  cannot  altogether 
deny  the  serene  man's  assertion  ;  but  this  is  to  be  remarked 
in  passing,  between  man  and  man  there  is  a  difference,  as 
there  is  between  the  mighty  cedar  and  the  dwarf-fir  on  the 
heath ;  between  the  heaven-reaching  palm,  and  the  little 
holly  in  the  forest.  And  in  this  connection  the  question 
might  be  put,  why  has  the  old  doctrine  of  the  elect  been 

1  The  physiological,  elementary  antagonisms  might  have  been  discussed  previ- 
ously, viz. :  soul  and  body,  spirit  and  nature,  freedom  and  necessity,  first  and  sec- 
ond life ;  but  this  would  have  led  too  far. 


312  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

left  out  of  notice  so  much  of  late  in  theology,  on  account 
of  its  old,  hard,  discouraging,  but  also  outworn  form?  It 
might  so  happen  that  a  dialectically  clever  man,  who  him- 
self believes  strongly  enough  in  the  elect  of  his  party,  even 
now  charges  the  old  doctrine  of  election  upon  the  reform- 
ers, instead  of  inquiring  whether  a  kernel  of  truth  has 
not,  perhaps,  been  sticking  in  the  shell  which  burst  long 
since.-^  It  might  even  be  that  to-day  many  theologians, 
with  all  compliments  for  the  comparative  greatness  of  the 
absolutely  elect  of  the  elect,  are  endeavoring  to  take  the 
crown  of  that  peerless  greatness  from  him,  while  just  now 
the  philologists,  the  poets,  the  profane  historians,  are  crown- 
ing anew  with  enthusiasm  their  elect. 

The  second  antagonism,  the  psychological,  expresses  the 
fact  that  man,  as  a  spiritual  being,  develops  his  life  in  the 
reciprocal  action  of  a  double  form  of  consciousness,  the 
reflecting  consciousness  turned  toward  our  earthly  days 
and  the  earth,  and  the  more  noctural,  visionary,  intuitive 
consciousness,  which  is  directed  toward  the  universe; 
therefore,  also,  toward  the  manifestations  of  a  higher 
world. 

This  fact,  of  which  Socrates  in  his  mysterious  tutelary 
genius,  his  dat/idvLov,  had  an  experience ;  which  Plato  des- 
ignated by  his  divine  /xa'^ca,  by  the  frenzy  or  ecstasy  of 
poets  and  philosophers  ;  which  Josephus  knew  of ;  concern- 
ing which  philosophers  like  Krause  and  Hegel,  and  poets 
like  Atterbom,  have  expressed  dark  hints, — this  fact 
authors  such  as  Perty,  and  as  the  deceased  prince  of 
Neuwied,  have  denominated  the  place,  or  rather  the  pole 
in   the   human   soul-life,  by  which  the   same   becomes   an 

»  "  Jaxthausen  is  a  castle  on  the  Jaxt,"  said  the  little  son  of  Gotz  von  Berlichin- 
gen,  from  the  school-book,  without  imagining  that  he  was  at  the  time  himself  in 
the  castle. 


THE   KINGDOM    OF   GOD  313 

organ  for  revelations  of  a  new  and  higher  world,  for  new 
revelations  of  God  himself,  above  the  universal  revelation 
through  creation  and  the  inner  human  life.  One  of  the 
leaders  of  the  latest  theological  agitation,  however,  the 
well-known  Dr.  Schenkel,  would,  to  be  sure,  inform  us  that 
not  the  reason,  not  the  will,  not  even  the  susceptibility, 
relates  to  Deitj^,  but  only  the  conscience,  the  isolated 
conscience.  This  is  to  be  designated  as  the  need  of  truth, 
and  this  need  is  an  organ,  and  this  organ  is,  so  far  as  is 
possible,  an  organ  for  the  reception  of  higher  influences. 
In  this  so-called  organ,  then,  stands  the  moon  in  her 
last  quarter,  like  a  little  gray  cloud  in  the  clear  day,  over 
against  the  real  sun  of  revelation,  i.  e.,  the  conscious- 
ness of  Christ,  as  the  approved  ability  to  behold  the 
Father  in  his  providence,  all  eternity  in  time,  all  heaven 
in  the  phenomena  of  the  universe,  and  so  also  to  authenti- 
cate the  sharpest  judgment  regarding  the  things  of  the 
world. 

We  have,  consequently,  found  the  elect  man  and  the  all- 
comprehending  revelation-organ  of  the  same,  a  wholly 
unique  genius-life,  in  which  the  height  of  humanity  and  the 
depth  of  divinity  can  come  together  in  one,  —  and  only  in 
the  depth  of  divinity  can  such  a  life  have  its  foundation. 
For  it  is  a  modern  weakness  of  thought,  when  in  these 
days  the  human  is  manifoldly  made  the  primary  determin- 
ing principle  for  the  divine ;  as  though  it  were  easier  for 
man  to  become  God  than  for  God  to  become  man,  easier  to 
ascend  up  to  heaven  than  to  come  down  from  heaven. 
Even  the  incarnation  of  God,  or  of  the  Son  of  God,  re- 
quired a  great  historical  mediation  through  the  people  of 
God. 

Thus  we  come  to  the  third  antagonism,  the  ethnological. 
Two  ridges  run  parallel  to  each  other  through  the  history 


314  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

of  the  old  world  to  Christ.  It  is  the  antagonism  of  Shem 
and  Japheth,  the  antagonism  of  two  kinds  of  blessing,  the 
blessing  of  a  stable  worship  of  God  and  the  blessing  of  ? 
restless  spiritual  conquest  of  the  world ;  yet  not  to  he  con- 
founded with  the  very  similar  antagonism  of  Seth  and  Cain. 
The  idiosyncrasies  of  the  Hebrew  religious  turn  of  mind 
and  of  the  Greek  radically  human  turn  of  mind  are  as 
far  apart  as  the  east  is  from  the  west ;  e.  g.,  in  the  immedi- 
ateness  of  the  Hebrew,  in  the  mediateness  or  the  media- 
tion-talent of  the  Greek  language,  in  the  symbolism 
characteristic  of  the  one  side,  in  the  mythology  peculiar  to 
the  other,  in  the  divine  content  with  the  Hebrews,  in  the 
classical  human  form  with  the  Greeks.  But  just  because 
of  this  extreme  difference  the  two  tendencies  were  suited 
to  each  other  ;  they  must  become  one  in  Christianity.  But 
if  an  injudicious  friend  of  the  Holy  Scriptures  desired  to 
criticise  the  Greek  forms,  or  even  the  ecclesiastic  classical 
forms,  after  the  pattern  of  the  Hebrew  forms  (e.  g.,  Homer 
after  Job) ,  that  would  surely  be  denominated  presumptuous 
ignorance.  And  yet  the  whole  development  of  the  Hebrew 
theocracy,  including  its  New  Testament  consummation,  is 
still  manifoldly  criticised  (especially  by  Strauss)  exclu- 
sively after  ideas  which  have  been  derived  from  the  Greek 
or  the  Greco-Roman  antiquity.  Certainly  the  second  one- 
sidedness  is  not  better  than  the  first. 

Also  the  fourth  antagonism  of  the  old  time  is  overborne 
by  the  most  manifold  obscurations  and  obliterations  ;  it  is 
the  economic  antagonism.  According  to  the  Sacred  Scrip- 
tures the  history  of  the  revelation  of  salvation  branches  off 
into  the  history  of  the  Old  Testament  theocracy,  as  the 
typical  prefigurement  of  the  New  Testament  real  Kingdom 
of  God,  and  into  the  history  of  the  founding  of  this  king- 
dom upon  the  groundwork  of  the  patriarchal  period ;  or 


THE    KINGDOM    OF    GOD  315 

into  the  period  of  the  people  of  God  in  their  minority,  who 
had  by  a  written  law  and  ceremonial  picture-language  to 
be  educated  for  faith,  and  into  the  epoch  of  the  appearance 
of  the  people  of  God  attained  to  majority,  for  whom  the 
law  had  become  spiritual  life,  and  the  picture-language 
living  word.  Now  we  know  that,  in  consequence  of  the 
gi'eat  migration  of  nations,  and  the  water  baptism  of 
nations,  this  relation  has  in  the  church  been  repeating 
itself,  and  that  with  the  Reformation  a  period  of  ma- 
jority began  a  second  time.  Accordingl}^,  our  Evangelical 
Christian  people  should  now  move  as  securely  upon  the 
new  stage,  as  the  Christians  of  the  apostolic  times 
moved  upon  the  stage  of  manhood  ;  since  the}',  with  vic- 
torious clearness,  struck  through  the  extremes,  the  legalistic 
Ebionism  of  the  Judaizers  on  the  one  hand,  and  the  anti- 
nomian  libertinism  of  the  Gnostics  on  the  other. _  But  how 
many  vacillations  appear  here  on  our  stage :  Tractarians, 
Ritualists  (German}-,  too,  has,  alas,  its  Ritualists,  who  are 
indirectly  working  into  the  hands  of  non-ecclesiasticism), 
Confessionalists  of  the  most  diverse  classes,  pure  repre- 
sentatives of  the  Statute,  and  on  the  other  side  numerous 
Neo-Gnostic  forms  of  unmanuerliuess,  libertinism,  social 
insubordination,  which  claim  first  of  all  to  be  real  freedom 
and  majority.  The  index  of  maturity,  however,  is  the  full 
conservation  of  the  pure  content  of  the  experienced  peda- 
gogical training  relieved  of  its  shell,  and  the  free  use  of 
discipline  as  a  prophylactic  to  relapsing  into  minority,  and 
the  conservation  of  freedom  is  respect  for  the  freedom  of 
others,  for  the  right,  for  the  abandoned  stage  itself;  while 
modern  Gnosticism,  which  puts  before  us  the  prospect  of  a 
new  knowledge,  but  in  the  mean  time  serves  us  with  mere 
lawlessness,  is  even  now  threatened  with  a  complete  relapse 


316  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

under  tutelage,  as  could  be  shown  by  documents,  with 
the  names  of  places,  persons,  and  tendencies. 

The  first  clearly  New  Testament  antagonism  is  the 
organic^  the  consummation  of  the  individual.  Here  the  entire 
greatness  of  the  antagonism  with  the  entire  intimacy  of  the 
union  is  expressed.  Christ  the  shepherd,  his  people  the 
flock  ;  Christ  the  foundation-stone,  those  who  are  his  living 
stones  of  the  spiritual  temple ;  Christ  the  vine,  they  the 
branches ;  Christ  the  bridegroom,  the  church  the  bride ; 
Christ  the  head,  the  church  his  body.  Even  this  har- 
monious antagonism  between  the  highest  authority  and  the 
highest  liberty  is  seldom  kept  pure  in  its  ideality.  Not  to 
speak  of  those  who  would,  with  hierarchical  mediations,  be- 
cause of  the  greatness  of  the  antagonism,  break  through 
this  intimate  and  indissoluble  connection,  —  in  how  many 
ways,  even  on  our  own  grounds,  is  this  sacred  union  in- 
jured !  And  if  we  complain  especially  that  the  dignity 
of  Christ,  the  God-man,  the  Redeemer,  is  so  manifoldly 
detracted  from  and  disparaged,  yet  we  would  not  forget 
that  the  dignity  of  man  is  also,  in  many  ways,  still  dis- 
figured by  dwarfed  and  distorted  forms  of  living  Chris- 
tianity. Yet  would  any  one  have  the  entire  intimacy  of 
the  spiritual  union  with  Christ,  let  him  manifest  it  by  keep- 
ing pure  the  entire  difference,  the  entire  sublimity  of 
Christ ;  and  would  he  glorify  this  sublimity,  then  he  should 
remember  that  even  Christ  himself  would  see  himself 
glorified  in  his  members.  But  how  much  the  true  knowl- 
edge of  human  dignity  is  conditioned  by  the  true  knowledge 
of  God,  —  this  the  latest  times  have  taught.  First  the 
idea  of  a  personal  God  was  obliterated,  then  the  picture 
of  Christ,  the  God-man ;  at  present  many  are  already  on 
the  way  to  a  denial  of  the  truth  of  human  nature. 

A  second  antagonism  has  its  force  even  in  the  Old  Testa- 


THE   KINGDOM    OF   GOD  317 

ment,  but  first  attains  its  full  significance  in  the  New,  the 
allegorical,  as  a  higher  poiver  of  the  psychological.  It  is  the 
difierence  between  faith  itself,  or  the  truths  of  faith,  and 
the  temporary  conceptions  in  which  they  are  clothed.  The 
distinction  rests  upon  the  law  of  the  development  of  all 
life.  It  is  truly  remarkable  how  uncertain  and  fluctuating 
are  the  ideas  of  the  law  of  life-development  even  yet.  The 
idea  which,  e.  g.,  Hegel  had  of  the  development  of  all  life, 
and  particularly  of  the  history  of  philosophy,  is  at  present, 
although  his  thoughts  on  development  have  been  in  them- 
selves abundantly  appreciated,  an  idea  long  since  con- 
demned in  philosophy.  But  the  Hegelian  error,  that  every 
development  of  life  starts  from  the  poorest  form,  and  by 
its  poverty,  by  its  contradiction,  produces  the  antithesis, 
with  this  to  gain  a  richer  form  in  the  s^-nthesis,  —  this 
error  the  Tiibingen  theologian  Bauer,  in  unfortunate  de- 
pendence upon  the  school-philosophy,  has  applied  to  the 
apostolic  age,  and  from  the  sad  heritage  of  it  comes  a  great 
part  of  the  present  boisterous  opposition  to  the  Bible.  The 
whole  method  is  the  posthumous  oflTspring  of  a  defunct 
philosophy,  a  cast-off  philosopher's  mantle,  and  so  the 
court-dress  of  the  "  modern  theology."  A  consequence 
thereof  is  the  utter  confounding  of  the  temporary  concep- 
tion of  faith  with  the  eternal  content  of  faith.  But  Christ 
has  clearly  indicated  for  us  the  law  of  development,  in  his 
beautiful  parable  of  the  growth  of  the  seed  (Mark  4 :  26- 
28).  First  the  seed,  then  the  blade,  the  stalk,  after  that  the 
ear,  then  the  full  corn  in  the  ear.  Here,  now,  is  the  law 
of  all  development,  clear;  the  forms  change,  the  sub- 
stance, the  essence,  remains  specifically  the  same ;  the  only 
alteration  consists  in  the  fact  that  the  seed  reappears  in  the 
harvest,  not  poorer,  but  richer  ;  not  that  perhaps  from  many 
Round  grains  is  left  in  the  end  only  one  little  motlier-grain, 


318  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

but  that  the  seed  cast  into  the  ground  reappears  with  much 
fruit.  Yet  for  many  even  this  little  parable  seems  to  be 
too  high  a  school.  With  the  invariableness  of  the  essence 
some  would  have  the  forms  to  be  also  invariable,  either  by 
inventing  a  constancy  of  the  same  forms,  or  arresting  the 
formation  of  forms,  even  crowding  it  back  into  the  middle 
ages  or  into  the  seventeenth  century.  These  choke  and 
smother  the  living  essence  with  dead  forms.  Another  class, 
on  the  contrary,  would  have  the  essence  to  vary  constantly 
with  a  morbidly  increased  change  of  the  forms,  so  that 
with  the  lawless  play  of  form  the  essence  itself  is  dissipated ; 
e.  g.,  we  are  to  believe  that  Christianity,  as  early  as  during 
the  first  three  centuries,  changed  its  peculiar  form  two  or 
three  times.  Again,  the  confession-obligation,  which  once 
was  a  free,  self-obligating  of  the  body  of  believers,  and 
made  of  it  a  spiritual  phalanx  over  against  all  the  hie- 
rarchical powers  of  the  world,  we  are  to-day  to  regard  as 
but  a  despotic  fetter  and  hierarchical  statute.  So  also  the 
moral  discipline  to  be  used  b}^  the  church,  which  once 
proved  itself  the  salt  of  the  earth  and  made  of  morally 
sunken  cities  widely  illuminating  places  of  piety  and  cul- 
ture, is  to  be  in  these  times  rejected  as  working  only 
hyprocrisy. 

But  as  the  promise  of  salvation  in  the  Scriptures  passes 
through  many  perishable  forms,  and  remains  always  the 
same  in  substance,  only  becomes  continually  richer,  con- 
tinually more  distinct  and  definite,  so  the  fulfilment  of 
this  promise,  Christianity,  also  passes  through  the  ecclesi- 
astical times  and  their  forms,  only  continually  more  richly 
unfolded.  Now  as  to  the  distinction  between  faith  and  the 
conceptions  of  faith,  upon  which  the  law  of  ecclesiastical 
development  rests,  we  cannot  be  mistaken  in  affirming  that 
many    wholly    mistake    and    obliterate    this     distinction, 


THE    KINGDOM    OF   GOD  319 

grounded,  as  it  is,  upon  the  antagonism  between  the 
temporal  conceptions  and  reflections  and  the  internal 
experience  and  intuition  of  man  directed  towards  eternity. 
And  herein  the  neological  theolog}'  agrees  perfectly  with 
the  dead  orthodox}^,  that  it  holds  the  temporary  concep- 
tions of  faith  to  be  the  real  faith  itself.  We  know,  on  the 
contrary,  that  in  the  old  covenant  the  rainbow  had  a 
sacramental  import,  then  the  stars  of  heaven,  afterward 
circumcision  and  the  passover,  until  the  sacrament 
appeared  in  the  New  Testament  form ;  that  also  in  the 
church  faith  has  passed  through  manifold  conceptions. 
For  faith  itself  the  sacrament  has  by  all  its  changes  in 
form  become  constantly  richer  and  more  beautiful,  while 
the  people  either  no  longer  know  any  sacramental  certainty 
of  the  hollow  conception  or  adhere  to  antiquated  school- 
forms  and  church-forms,  which  have  made  temporary 
investures  of  the  sacrament.  So  the  word  of  God  is  the 
living  unity  of  the  letter  and  the  spirit.  The  word  is 
letter,  says  one  party,  therefore  it  must  be  understood 
absolutely  according  to  the  letter  ;  the  word  is  letter,  says 
the  other  party,  therefore  it  must  give  place  to  the  free 
wordless  spirit.  Thus  one  of  the  parties  puts  the  whole 
accent  of  the  idea  of  faith  upon  the  letter,  or,  in  other 
words,  upon  the  momentary  exegesis  of  the  letter,  ex- 
changing the  living  word  for  a  dead  letter ;  the  other  does 
the  same  thing,  substituting  for  the  dead  word  a  vague 
fancy  of  spirit. i  But  faith  itself  has  never  accented  its 
passing  conceptions.  The  ark  of  Noah  has  disappeared  ; 
the  essence  of  the  ark  has  remained  in  the  church.  The 
altar  with  the  sacrifice  has  disappeared  ;  the  essence  of  the 
sacrifice,  the  eternal  propitiation  in  the  death  of  Christ,  has 

1  Moreover,  persons  of  the  one  party  often  become  those  of  the  other,  as  with  a 
uirning  of  the  hand. 


320  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

remained.  Elijah  let  his  mantle  fall,  the  pious  Hezekiah 
destroyed  the  brazen  serpent,  Jehovah  twice  suffered  his 
temple  to  be  consumed  by  fire ;  all  this  change  of  form 
impoverished  not,  but  in  each  case  enriched,  faith  itself. 
When,  now,  a  dead  legalism  accents  the  perishable  forms, 
it  is,  at  least  for  the  most  part,  honorable  narrowness ;  if, 
however,  they  are  accented  for  the  purpose  of  characteriz- 
ing faith  itself  as  perishable,  this  cannot,  at  least  frequently, 
be  so  honorably  intended ;  among  other  things  an  un- 
mistakably bad  consciousness  is  therein  operative.  But 
could  a  poet  complain  that  the  cast-off  integuments  of  his 
development  are  pulled  about  and  beaten,  much  more  has 
faith  a  right  to  protect  itself  against  the  violence  which 
pulls  and  tears  at  its  cast-off  vestments,  as  if  they  had 
to  be  arranged  as  grave-clothes  for  itself.  So  one  tears  at 
the  clerical  and  theocratic  church-regulations  of  the 
sixteenth  century ;  another  at  the  overstrained  doctrine  of 
inspiration  prevalent  in  the  seventeenth  century ;  ^  a  third 
at  the  ascetic  forms  of  piety  in  the  eighteenth  century. 
Faith  itself,  however,  has  at  all  times  sought  its  essentiality 
as  little  in  its  vestments  as  if  it  had  clothed  itself  in  pure 
ether  or  the  aurora.^  I  mean  to  affirm  this,  however,  not 
merely  of  universal  religious  ideas,  but  of  the  real  full  faith 
of  the  kingdom  of  God.  An  illustration  will  make  the 
entire  distinction  clear.  The  Christian  believes  still  to- 
day, with  the  Holy  Scriptures,  in  heaven  and  hell.  Now, 
the  mediaeval  Christian  found  heaven  above  the  firmament, 


1  Vid.  Rothe :  Zur  Theologie.  Besides,  the  object  of  the  fantastic  knighthood  is 
to  the  utmost  disfigured,  as  if  the  theological  doctrine  of  inspiration  in  the  seven- 
teenth century  had  gone  even  beyond  the  Montanistic,  and  made  of  man  a  mero 
machine.  Such  a  caricature  is  then  charged  not  merely  to  the  theology  of  the 
seventeenth  century,  but  also  to  the  church  of  present  times. 

«  Comp.  Rom.  10 :  6  ff.,  Deut.  30 :  12, 13.  Also  the  different  representations  of 
Scheol. 


THE    KINGDOM    OF    GOD  321 

hell  in  the  interior  of  the  earth.  The;je  conceptions  have 
fallen,  cries  one  to  us  ;  consequently  there  remains  at  most 
a  sort  of  heaven  and  of  hell  in  the  human  breast.  But 
faith  is  to-day  as  certain  as  in  the  middle  ages  of  its 
conviction  that  all  the  inner  relations  in  God's  world  come 
likewise  to  appearance ;  that,  therefore,  at  some  time  a 
separation  between  matured  sanctification  and  matured 
obstinacy  will  occur,  and  that  internal  happiness  will  find 
likewise  its  home,  and  internal  unhappiness  also  its  place. 
The  local  particularities,  however,  in  themselves  considered, 
cohere  with  passing  conceptions  and  reflections  which  rest 
upon  temporary  views  of  the  world  ;  they  have  never  been 
the  concern  of  revelation  and  faith.  But  the  newer  cos- 
mology knows  much  more  (with  the  anticipating  words  of 
the  Lord)  of  the  many  mansions  in  the  Father's  house  than 
did  the  old ;  also  of  terrible  world-wastes.  Nay,  we  can 
say  general^,  as  it  regards  the  conceptions,  faith  in  the 
midst  of  the  new  knowledge  of  the  world  is  much  less  at  a 
loss  for  apparel,  and,  indeed,  true  royal  apparel,  than  in 
the  midst  of  the  old.  So  with  respect,  also,  to  the  person- 
ality of  God,  to  heavenly  appearances,  to  the  union  of 
divinity  and  humanity  in  Christ,  to  the  atonement,  and  to 
the  universal  spread  of  the  gospel. 

Also  concerning  the  social  antagonism  of  the  Christian 
world,  the  antagonism  between  state  and  church,  in  which 
the  ethnological  antagonism  of  the  Hellenic  and  the  Israel 
itish  culture  is  reflected,  much  uncertainty  and  obscurity 
are  promulgated,  although  it  is  a  favorite  theme  of  the  day. 
No  wonder ;  for  the  judgment  regarding  this  antagonism 
coheres  with  the  most  diverse  and  passionate  interests. 
Still  the  old  mediaeval  forms  of  the  consolidating  of  the 
two  establishments,  though  in  principle  subverted,  stand 
before  our  eyes  in  the  antagonism  of  the  Occidental  Papacy, 


322  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

whif.li  would  like  to  be  also  Caesarism,  and  the  Oriental 
Caesaro-Papacy  ;  the  one  form  supporting  its  threats  by 
romantic  enticements,  the  other  its  craft  by  great  acts  of 
violence.  Even  in  the  Protestant  world  there  are  ecclesi- 
astical or  pseudo-ecclesiastical  ideas  which  would  enslave 
or  reduce  to  a  mere  diminishing  shadow  the  state,  political 
or  pseudo-political  ideas  which  would  enslave  or  even  utter- 
ly destroy  the  church.  In  opposition  to  these  come  views 
which  aim  at  rending  completeh^  asunder  state  and  church, 
without  being  clear  on  which  side  the  common  possessions, 
marriage,  the  school,  the  oath,  and  others,  are  to  fall. 

But  respecting  these  preliminary  questions,  the  views  of 
men  engaged  in  the  same  latest  ecclesiastical  agitation  also 
differ  widely.  According  to  one  voice,  the  state  is  wholly 
to  absorb  the  church,  in  that  it  takes  up  Christianity  wholly 
into  itself  and  becomes  the  consummated  kingdom  of  God 
(Rothe)  ;  according  to  the  other,  it  is  to  surrender  even  its 
specifically  Christian  character,  thus  opening  the  way  for 
the  culture  of  the  Mohammedans  and  the  Japanese  (Blunt- 
schli).  According  to  one  opinion,  the  historic  Episcopal 
power  of  the  state  over  the  church  is  to  be  retained,  that 
by  the  help  of  the  state  the  ecclesiastical  confessor  may  be 
forced  to  confess  his  want  of  a  confession  ;  according  to  the 
other,  the  state  is  to  let  the  church,  with  the  foundation  of  its 
Christian  principles,  drift.  We  hold,  nevertheless,  that 
both  establishments  are  from  God,  and  that  not  only  all 
consolidations,  all  reciprocal  enslavements,  are  contrar}?"  to 
their  nature,  but  also  all  separation  proper,  such  as  is  had 
in  view  by  many  ;  since  here,  also,  the  question  respects  a 
harmonious  antagonism,  therefore  a  sound  reciprocal  action 
between  an  independent  Christian  state  and  an  independent 
Christian  church.  Now,  without  regard  to  exact  defini- 
tions, according  to  which  one  might  describe  the  state  as 


THE    KINGDOM    OF    GOD  323 

the  religion  of  a  national  fellowship,  the  church  as  the  fel- 
lowship of  an  international  religion,  the  problem  ol'  each 
is  still  to  be  described  to  the  extent  that  the  church  has  to 
care  especially  for  the  Christian  religious  dogmas,  the  state 
especially  for  the  Christian  moral  or  humane  dogmas,  it  is 
true,  the  announcement  has  recently  been  made  that  the 
day  of  dogmas  is  past ;  but  that  was,  certainly,  not  a  dogma 
of  true  science.  Even  the  saying  of  a  famous  theologian, 
that  dogmas  are  the  church's  own,  and  stricken  with  decay, 
while  on  the  contrary  the  development  of  tlie  morality  of 
the  state  free  from  dogma  stands  in  bloom,  rests  upon  a  re- 
markable lack  of  memory.  The  first  New  Testament  dogma 
(recorded  in  Acts  15)  was  a  moral  dogma,  and  down  till 
within  the  fourth  centurj^  linguistic  usage  termed  the  moral 
maxims  of  the  church,  as  well  as  the  religious^  dogmas.  It 
was  entirely  in  accordance  with  the  law  after  which  the  an- 
tagonisms, in  their  misunderstanding  and  unwisdom,  on 
both  sides  strain  themselves,  that  the  Christian  spirit  in  the 
state  began  to  promote  the  humane  maxims  as  soon  as  the 
church  began  to  promote  its  religious  maxims  at  the  ex- 
pense of  the  humane,  albeit  according  to  the  sound  relation 
the  two  lines  condition  each  other  throughout.  So  far,  too, 
it  could  go  then,  in  the  second  half  of  the  mediaeval  period 
and  later,  that  societies  of  one-sided  ecclesiasticism  were 
formed,  and,  in  opposition  to  these,  societies  of  one-sided 
though  always  Christian  humanity.  When  at  the  end,  how- 
ever, men  would  array  the  ecclesiastical  system  against 
Christian  humane  maxims,  especially  against  freedom  of 
conscience,  religious  toleration,  universal  human  rights, 
that  is  a  completely  spoiled  church  construction  ;  and  when, 
on  the  other  hand,  ultra  human  conceptions  are  marshalled 
in  boisterous  bands  against  the  right  of  the  ecclesiastical 
maxims,  that  is  likewise  wild  masonry  in  the  temple  of 


324  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

humanity.  Here,  therefore,  it  speciall}^  behoves  us  to  set 
free  again  a  thoroughly  harmonious  antagonism  from  its 
ruinous  disfigurations,  and  to  expect  confidently  the  glori- 
ous results  which  a  free  union  of  church  and  state,  of  the 
living  ecclesiastical  Christian  faith  and  the  unfeigned  Chris- 
tian humanity,  will  produce. 

The  last  antagonism  which  we  have  to  mention  is  the 
cosmicaU  as  the  higher  power  of  the  economical.  All  the 
more  important  religious  systems  of  mankind  have  each 
embraced  a  beginning  and  an  end  of  the  world,  another 
life  as  well  as  this,  —  time  and  eternity.  But  Christianity, 
in  keeping  with  the  universality  and  depth  of  the  Christian 
spirit,  is  specially  conformed  to  such  an  all-embracing  view 
of  things.  It  was  reserved  for  the  modern  progress  after 
the  appearance  of  the  Hegelian  philosophy,  to  limit  the 
view  of  the  world  essentially  to  the  earth.  And  so  in  the 
realm  of  theology,  also,  many  have  begun  to  restrict  them- 
selves religiously  to  the  limits  of  the  world,  as  defined  hy 
the  latest  wisdom ;  to  restrict  themselves  with  the  history 
of  a  humanity  which  can  know  neither  a  beginning  nor  an 
end  of  things ;  to  restrict  themselves,  with  the  soarings  of 
the  intellect  and  the  yearnings  of  the  heart,  to  the  hopes 
of  this  present  earthly  life.  We  know,  indeed,  that  the 
material  light  has  free  course  from  star  to  star  ;  but  to  the 
nobler,  immaterial  lights,  this  free  course  is  to  be  barri- 
caded ;  the  earth  is  to  be  a  pagoda  of  the  soul  in  a  rocky 
cavern ;  the  history  of  the  world  a  seclusion  in  the  midst 
of  the  universe,  and  the  starry  heavens  a  scattered  collec- 
tion of  heathen  ofierings  which  never  come  into  association 
with  each  other.  Manifestly,  even  the  spectrum  anal3'sis 
could  not  console  us  in  the  experience  of  such  infinite  im- 
poverishment. Let  us,  then,  rejoice  that  our  Christianit}^, 
with  the  antique  world-pictures  of  "  anticipative  peoples," 


THE   KINGDOM    OF   GOD  325 

is  in  advance,  also,  as  to  the  proud  distinction  of  uniting 
heaven  and  earth,  time  and  eternity.  Besides,  we  need 
just  so  much  space  and  just  so  much  time  for  the  full 
expansion  of  the  kingdom  of  God. 

The  kingdom  of  God  itself  the  older  theologians  divided, 
not  without  grounds,  into  the  Kingdom  of  Power,  the  King- 
dom of  Grace,  the  Kingdom  of  Glory.  Still,  it  must  be 
remarked  that  each  of  these  kingdoms  properly  separates 
into  two  kingdoms  ;  the  kingdom  of  power  into  God's  rule 
over  entire  nature,  and  his  rule  over  the  whole  rebellion  of 
such  intelligences  as,  in  the  misuse  of  freedom,  have  gone 
astray ;  the  kingdom  of  grace,  into  the  typical  prefigura- 
tion  of  the  real  kingdom  of  heaven,  or  the  Old  Testament 
theocracy,  and  into  the  real,  i.  e.,  spiritually  potent,  New 
Testament  kingdom  itself ;  the  kingdom  of  glory,  into  the 
realm  of  the  triumphant  church  in  the  other  world,  and  the 
union  of  that  world  and  this  in  the  final  consummation. 
Accordingly,  a  world  made  the  perfect  organ  and  the  trans- 
parent symbol  of  the  kingdom  of  God  is  the  appearance 
of  the  kingdom  of  glory.  But  the  rule  of  the  Divine 
Omnipotence  and  Wisdom  over  heaven  and  earth,  the  spirit- 
ual world  and  the  corporeal  world,  is  the  antecedent  condi- 
tion to  the  founding  of  the  kingdom  of  grace.  The  power- 
realm  of  God  is  called  the  kingdom  of  power,  because  the 
personal  Spirit  of  God  bears  sway  over  the  same,  and  be- 
cause he,  with  invincible  might,  bears  all  things,  compre- 
hended in  a  single  plan,  on  towards  a  single  end,  which  is 
the  end  of  the  world,  —  doing  this  by  virtue  of  a  perfectly 
harmonious  motion  of  the  world,  in  which  he  himself  rec- 
onciles the  conflict  between  spirits  and  forces.  The  belief 
in  this  power-kingdom  is  a  fundamental  religious  article  in 
which  the  most  diflferent  views  of  the  world,  so  far  as  they 
are  religious,  agree  ;  only  they  define  it  differently.     In  tbi3 


326  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

belief,  the  Old  Testament  witnesses  to  the  All-Ruling,  and 
it  is  a  true  hj^mn  on  the  kingdom  of  power,  when  the  one 
hundred  and  forty-eighth  Psalm  speaks  forth  the  unani- 
mous, actual,  conscious  and  unconscious,  willing  and  un- 
willing, praise  of  all  creatures  to  the  glorification  of  God. 
In  this  spirit  the  apostolic  church,  in  a  sublime  prayer, 
glorifies  the  universal  rule  of  God,  even  over  the  conspiracy 
of  all  instruments  of  darkness  against  the  Lord's  Christ 
and  his  people.  Of  a  truth  against  thy  holy  servant  Jesus, 
both  Herod  and  Pontius  Pilate,  with  the  Gentiles,  and  the 
tribes  of  Israel,  were  gathered  together,  to  do  whatsoever 
thy  hand  and  thy  counsel  determined  before  to  be  done. 
(Acts  4  :  24,  et  seq.)  But  the  being  of  God,  as  it  is  Love 
itself,  could  not  be  satisfied  with  a  kingdom  of  power,  with 
the  rule  of  Omnipotence  over  the  regular  circuit  of  the 
stars,  over  all  circles  and  circlings  of  life  in  nature ;  as 
little  could  it  be  satisfied  with  a  rule  of  the  Highest  Wisdom 
over  the  revolt  of  opposing  intelligences,  with  the  fact 
which  the  poet  has  expressed  by  the  words,  ducunt  volen- 
tern  fata,  nolentem  trahunt,  —  the  willing  are  led  by  the  fates, 
the  unwilling  dragged.  And  the  more  reason  was  there  for 
founding  a  higher  kingdom,  a  kingdom  of  realized  free- 
dom and  love  above  the  realm  of  necessity,  inasmuch  as 
the  power-kingdom  itself  was  designed  only  as  the  basis 
thereof,  and  as  over  against  the  first  appearance  of  the 
kingdom  of  light  and  pious  freedom  the  beginnings  of  a 
kingdom  of  darkness  and  the  false  freedom  of  rebellion 
presented  themselves.  It  cannot  content  the  holy  God, 
who  holds  his  own  personality  pure,  and  desires  to  mirror 
and  glorify  himself  in  a  kingdom  of  personal  existences, 
everlastingly  to  extend  the  almightiness  of  his  rule  over 
the  power  of  the  rolling  worlds,  and  to  let  it  triumph  over 
the  impotence  of  rebellious  intelligences  ;  still  less  to  move 


THE   KINGDOM    OF    GOD  327 

iutelligences  in  the  play  of  only  a  seeming  freedom  after 
the  nature  of  a  concealed  destiny.  Not  so  much  the  roll- 
ing spheres  or  the  overthrow  of  evil  world-powers  is  it  that 
he  is  concerned  about,  as  about  the  hearts  of  men ;  and 
only  then  has  he  reached  his  aim  when  the  impelling  power 
of  his  love  has  become  in  them  the  innermost  self-impul- 
sion ;  when  his  freedom  has  become  their  freedom,  his  mind 
their  mind,  his  will  their  will ;  when  they  stand  in  a  true 
bond  of  love  with  him,  one  in  him  and  one  with  each  other  ; 
and  when  the  necessary  harmony  of  forces  is  taken  up  into 
the  service  of  a  free  harmony  of  souls. 

This  is  the  motive,  the  work,  and  the  aim  of  the  king- 
dom of  grace.  The  realm  of  love  which  God  has  through 
Christ  established  in  the  inner  being  of  mankind  is  called 
kingdom  of  grace,  because  it  is  based  upon  a  harmonious 
manifestation  of  justice  and  love,  upon  an  infinitely  gener- 
ous spiritual  administration,  which  so  arranges  that  from 
the  verdict  of  justice  goes  forth  the  saving  work  of  love. 
This  kingdom  is,  first,  in  a  legal  and  symbolical  form,  pre- 
figured in  the  Old  Testament  theocracy,  in  which  God  re- 
veals himself  as  the  King  of  his  people,  of  the  land  of  this 
people,  and  as  Director  of  all  its  destiny.  And  this  pre- 
figurement  serves  the  special  purpose  of  introducing  and 
mediating  the  realization  of  the  actual  kingdom  of  God,  — 
a  realization  by  the  centralization  of  all  verdicts  of  salva- 
tion in  Christ.  Therefore,  also,  the  antecedent  signs  and 
works  of  salvation  in  the  historj^  previous  to  Christ  pro- 
ceed from  antecedent  verdicts,  and  the  centre  of  the 
world's  history  is  a  verdict  of  God  upon  the  blindness 
of  the  world,  which,  by  the  atoning  compassion  of 
Christ,  has  been  spiritually  complied  with,  and  by  love's 
triumph  transformed  into  the  salvation  of  humanity. 
To  be  sure,  the  old  Socinian  word,  no  man  can  suf- 
fer for  another,  hns  been,  of  late,  proclniined  again  with 


328  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

variations,  as  if  it  were  the  newest  wisdom.^  Yet  the  pro- 
pounders  would  surely  have  needed  but  to  look  about  them 
a  little  to  see  how  one  man  can  suffer  not  only  by,  but  also 
on  account  of,  and  even  for,  another,  suffer  even  punish- 
ment. Thus,  had  they  not  chosen  rather  to  make  a  modern 
school-book  —  with  which  the  fettered  egotist  will  by  all 
means  hold  to  the  end  of  days  —  agree  with  their  own 
wishes  and  preconceptions,  they  might  have  beheld  number- 
less reflections  of  the  m3^stery  of  redemption  in  mundane 
history  itself.  To  be  sure,  moreover,  the  idea  of  repent- 
ance has  been  changed,  for  the  first  time,  by  the  later  the- 
ology, into  the  idea  of  atonement.  And  we  will  acknowl- 
edge that  no  man  was  ever  truly  redeemed  who  did  not,  by 
repentance,  sympathetically  receive,  in  his  own  bosom, 
Christ's  atoning  suffering  of  the  verdict.  This  realm  of 
grace  in  which  the  will  of  man  is  made  one  again  with  the 
will  of  God,  wherein  every  visitation  of  God  in  condemna- 
tion is  to  the  upright  changed  into  a  redemption,  is  a  true 
kingdom,  a  royal  kingdom  of  Christ.  For,  as  all  powers 
and  forces  of  evil  in  the  other  world  and  this  instinctively 
co-operate  in  one  rebellion  against  the  Messiah,  for  which 
reason  it  is  proper  to  speak  of  a  kingdom  of  darkness, 
although  those  leagues  between  Herod  and  Pilate,  Pilate 
and  Caiaphas,  Caiaphas  and  the  Jews,  are  always  but  tempo- 
rary coalitions  ;  so,  much  more  is  the  kingdom  of  grace,  or 
CA^en  the  inner,  invisible  church  of  Christ,  a  kingdom 
wherein  all  powers  of  good,  all  pious,  spiritual  works, -all 
open  testimonies  and  all  secret  sighs,  work  together  to  a 
single  end,  —  that  God  may  through  Christ  become  fully 
revealed  in  the  appearance  of  his  glory  over  all  the  world, 
and  in  the  whole  world  itself. 

And  that  is,  then,  the  conception  also  of  the  kingdom  ol 

*  Schwalb,  Der  Alte  und  der  Neue  Glaube.    Manrhot,  Ueber  den  Opfertod  Jesu. 


THE   KINGDOM    OF   GOD  329 

glory,  or,  what  is  the  same  thing,  of  the  kingdom  of  God 
in  its  consummation.  The  ideal  and  dynamic  foundations  of 
this  consummated  kingdom  are  laid  in  the  counsel  of  God, 
laid  as  deep  as  is  eternity,  and  as  firm  as  is  the  will  of  God, 
All  the  seeding  of  it  took  place  in  the  redeeming  work  of 
Christ,  and  the  first  fruits  of  the  harvest  are  being  in  ever 
increased  richness  brought  home  in  a  country  which  the  ex- 
altation of  Christ  has  made  the  land  of  glory.  The  Scrip- 
tures speak  in  the  sublimest  figures  of  the  future  in  which 
this  kingdom,  the  heavenly  Jerusalem,  shall  descend  to  the 
earth,  and  the  hope  of  residence  in  this  magnificent  cit}-, 
still  more  of  its  appearance,  has  always  most  profoundly 
moved,  waked,  purified,  comforted,  cheered,  all  Christian 
hearts  ;  in  a  thousand  songs,  winged  words  and  similitudes, 
it  has  poured  itself  forth.  But  we  must  not  here  abandon 
ourselves  to  this  feature  of  agreeable  prefigurement,  if  w^e 
would  keep  sight  of  our  problem.  Therefore,  we  ask,  how 
have  we  to  conceive  of  the  end  of  the  world's  course,  or  of 
the  kingdom  of  God  as  consummated  ? 

Nothing  is  more  to  the  purpose  than  that,  first  of  all,  we 
express  the  expectation  according  to  the  usual  balance  of 
the  thesis  and  the  antithesis  in  the  synthesis :  When  the 
kingdom  of  God's  power  has  become  one  with  the  kingdom 
of  God's  grace,  then  the  kingdom  of  glory  is  realized  ;  in 
other  words,  when  all  forces  of  the  Christian  world  and  all 
relations  of  this  world  have  been  converted  fully  into  a  uni- 
tary organ  of  spirit,  of  the  Spirit  of  Christ,  of  the  Love  of 
God.  To  this  idea  of  the  world's  end,  moreover,  the  true 
philosophy  of  spirit  surely  will  not  object.  But  what  holds 
good  of  the  kingdom  of  glory  in  its  entirety  holds  good 
also  of  its  individual  citizens.  "  There  is  a  psychical 
body,"  says  Paul,  "and  there  is  a  spiritual  body."  This 
can  mean  nothing  else  than  that  the  body  of  the  perfected 


330  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

man  is  to  be  wholly  a  spiritualized  body,  a  transparent 
image  of  the  pure  soul,  a  permeated  organ  of  the  soul. 
And  this,  then,  is  also  what  the  apostle  calls  the  glorious 
liberty  of  the  children  of  God,  in  which  their  whole  crea- 
tural  sphere  shall  be  transferred  from  the  round  of  neces- 
sity to  the  cultus  of  an  imperishable  existence. 

Entirely  the  same  view  is  implied  in  the  Scriptural  idea  of 
glory.  It  is  the  revelation  of  the  governing  spirit  in  the 
symbolic  lustre  of  the  appearance.  The  glory  of  Jehovah 
is  the  luminous  image  of  his  revelation  in  angelic  form, 
together  with  a  manifestation  of  the  holiness  of  his  being 
and  his  dominion  over  all  the  world  (Is.  6).  The  glory  of 
Christ  is,  in  its  first  form,  the  perfected  human  future-pic- 
ture of  the  eternal  Logos  before  the  throne  of  God  (John 
17)  ;  in  its  second  form,  the  spiritual  beaming  beauty  of 
Christ  before  the  eyes  of  his  disciples  (John  1)  ;  in  its 
third  form,  his  proper  exaltation  and  transfiguration,  with 
which  the  circle  of  his  power  is  illuminated  from  and  by 
the  centre  of  his  spiritually  perfected  personality.  Thus 
the  glory  of  Christians  also  is  determined  ;  it  is  the  whole 
personal  sphere  of  their  lives,  illuminated  and  shone 
through  by  the  personal  kernel  of  their  lives. 

The  sum  and  the  living  unity  of  all  these  spiritualiza- 
tions,  however,  is  the  kingdom  of  glory.  He  who  contends 
with  sin  —  the  sin  in  the  world  —  can  have  no  less  hope, 
or  he  rolls  the  stone  of  Sisj'^phus  up  the  steep,  which  always 
rolls  back  to  the  depth.  He  who  contends  with  evil,  strug- 
gles with  death,  can  have  no  less  hope,  or  he  suffers  the 
torments  of  Tantalus,  in  his  impotent  endeavor. 

The  order  of  the  moments  in  the  consummation  of  the 
kingdom  of  Ood^  Paul  has  definitely  indicated.  The  resur- 
rection of  Christ  is  the  consummation  of  this  kingdom,  in 
principle    (1  Cor.  15:  23;  Eph.    1:   19).     Tlie  ontoloo:ical 


THE   KINGDOM    OF   GOD  331 

truth,  that  spirit  has  absolute  power  over  nature,  the  per- 
sonal spirit  over  its  corporeal  sphere,  has  here  been  realized 
as  a  truth  of  histor}\  "With  this  fact  the  Spirit  of  glory, 
as  the  resurrection-germ  in  believers,  corresponds  (Rom.  8  ; 
1  Pet.  4:  14).  This  resurrection-seed  will  become  the 
harvest  in  the  first  resurrection  (1  Cor.  15:  23),  which 
belongs  to  the  beginning  of  the  cosmical  consummation. 
The  end,  then,  is  the  conclusion  of  the  one  day  which  is  as 
great  as  a  thousand  years.  In  this  altogether  organic 
period  of  transition  from  time  to  eternity,  Christ  will  de- 
stroy all  powers  of  sin  and  of  the  old  world  (1  Cor.  15: 
24-25);  then,  as  the  last  enemy,  death,  —  as  the  essence 
of  all  evil.  Finally  there  appears  yet  a  wonderful  change 
of  things.  The  official  work  of  Christ  in  redeeming  and 
renewing  has  been  accomplished,  and  his  antecedent  media- 
torial reign  now  passes  over  into  the  consummated  theoc- 
racy, the  immediate  rule  of  God  in  the  glorified  world  by 
virtue  of  the  omnipresence  of  the  Spirit  (v.  27-28).  In 
this  kingdom  of  the  immediate  intercourse  of  all  souls  with 
God,  Christ  has,  without  detriment  to  his  peerlessness,  di- 
vided his  inheritance  with  his  brethren  (Rom.  8 :  17),  or 
rather  has  made  it  the  eternal  joint  possession  of  himself 
and  his  people. 

Would  we  now  have  this  picture  of  the  future  of  Chris- 
tian humanity  made  clear  to  us  in  its  individual  features^ 
then  we  must  return  to  the  fundamental  forms  of  its  poten- 
tiality, which  were  sketched  in  the  first  division.  For  in 
the  consummation  nothing  more  or  less  than  the  whole 
potentiality  of  whatever  in  the  world  is  determined  for 
Christ  and  his  salvation  will  come  to  full  development  and 
appearance,  the  Alpha  become  the  Omega ;  so  that  at  the 
end  of  the  world  is  needed  only  a  single  stroke  from  above 


332  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

and  all  the  fundamental  forms  of  Christian  humanity  stand 
in  clear  light  and  complete  harmony. 

Especially  must  the  dynamic  differences  of  individuals 
be  fully  realized  in  the  kingdom  of  God,  be  realized  simply 
on  account  of  truth.  They  must  be  realized,  indeed,  with 
the  precondition  that  the  pure  consummation  of  the  dif- 
ferences between  the  central  geniuses  of  humanity  and 
the  multitudes  influenced  by  them  results  in  the  closest 
union  of  all  in  true  equality.  We  must  here  remember,  to 
understand  the  watchword  of  the  day.  Suffrage  Universel, 
that  every  subsequent  time  has  a  certain  ofllce  of  revenge 
upon  a  guilty  past.  In  times  gone  by,  from  the  obligations 
of  the  true  elect,  the  spiritual  princes  of  the  race,  rights 
and  privileges  of  the  traditionally  elect  have  been  made. 
As  a  consequence  of  this  guilt,  we  find  ourselves  in  the 
age  of  retribution,  and  the  revenge  is  —  suffrage  universel. 
But  we  need  onl}''  look  a  little  westward,  to  see  how  this 
watchword,  i.  e.,  the  abrogation  of  all  census,  all  concrete 
conditions  of  life,  can  put  the  noblest  spirits  of  a  nation  in 
the  background.  We  need  only  notice  the  virulent  com- 
motion in  the  ocean  of  popular  life,  to  see  how  this  abstract 
equality  is  designed  to  create  a  privileged  caste  under- 
neath, over  against  the  privileged  nobility  above,  retiring 
from  the  scene.  And  with  such  threatening  signs  in  the 
political  horizon,  where  the  abstract  right  of  voting  may 
have  become  a  temporary  expedient,  the  agitators  would 
even  in  the  church,  by  the  suffrage  of  the  masses  in  the 
individual  churches  and  in  the  national  churches,  call  into 
being  a  new  reformation  !  But  even  if  the  political  spirit 
may,  because  of  its  being  in  a  transitional  stage,  allow  it- 
self to  employ  majority-action,  the  ecclesiastical  spirit  can 
never,  never  so  do.  That  the  funeral  piles  and  the  in- 
quisitional dungeons  show ;   especially,  however,  is  it  de- 


THE   KINGDOM    OF    GOD  333 

clared  in  the  origination  of  the  name  of  Protestants  at 
Spire  in  the  year  1529.  Verily,  this  generation  of  con- 
fessors will  not  pass  till  the  Lord  comes,  even  thongh 
continuing  for  a  season  as  a  little  church  of  the  Anastasia 
at  Constantinople  in  the  time  of  the  Arians,  and  even  so 
would  it  stand  as  an  insuperable  reproach  to  every  enacted 
or  enacting  majority-felon3\  The  final  prospect,  however, 
is  simply  this :  Christianity  unfolds  the  forces,  sanctifies 
the  forces,  distinguishes  and  estimates  the  forces,  and  puts 
every  one  in  its  place ;  is  this  accomplished,  then  is  the 
organism  of  humanit}^  accomplished  in  the  kernel  of  hu- 
manity. 

But  then  will  also  the  antagonism  between  the  reflecting 
consciousness  and  the  visionary  consciousness  be  balanced, 
as  with  the  perfected  spirits  in  the  other  world  it  is  already 
balanced.  Should  this  expectation  be  considered  doubtful, 
we  can  point  to  its  similitudes  in  histor}^  itself.  Ordinary 
talent  only  reflects  ;  genius  thinks  and  works  intuitively. 
The  small  philosophers  are  reflection-philosophers  ;  the  great 
speak  of  ideas,  of  immediately  apprehended  ends,  of  in- 
tuitions. In  the  province  of  revelation,  however,  human 
intuitions  are  visions  accomplished  by  the  Spirit  of  God, 
and  Christ  the  Lord  has  comprehended  in  a  single  intuition 
the  two  worlds.  The  whole  visible  universe  was  to  him  a 
parable  of  the  invisible  ;  all  eternity  he  saw  projecting  into 
time.  But  Christ's  apprehension  is  the  anticipation  and 
foreshadowing  of  the  apprehension  of  all  believers. 

Thus,  too,  the  expectation  that  Shem  will  become  one 
with  Japheth ;  Israel  one  with  the  Hellenes ;  the  holy 
earnestness  of  piety  with  the  beaut}'  of  the  purest  culture  ; 
that,  therefore,  the  church,  which  already  in  the  time  of 
Hermas  (in  his  Shepherd)  had  the  appearance  of  an  old 
woman  gradually  beautifying  herself,  is  to  become  Christ's 


334  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

beautiful  maidenly  bride,  freed  from  all  the  spots  and 
wrinkles  of  false  piety,  —  this  expectation  also  belongs  to 
the  consummation  of  the  last  times.  About  the  restoration 
of  Israel,  individual  theologians,  particularly  Dr.  Baum- 
garten,^  have,  indeed,  in  a  literal  interpretation  of  Scrip- 
ture, made  wonderful  announcements,  how  the  Israelites 
are  in  the  evening  of  the  world  to  have  again  legal  privi- 
leges, and  renew,  in  a  higher  way,  their  former  cultus ; 
perhaps  slay  with  glorified  knives  glorified  oxen,  and 
observe  glorified  sacrificial  feasts,  and  the  Gentiles  with 
them.  Christianity  is  above  all  such  fancies.  Legal  privi- 
leges and  Jewish  customs  are,  as  connected  with  the  con- 
summation of  the  kingdom  of  God,  entirely  out  of  the 
question  ;  b}^  no  means,  however,  dynamical  rights,  i.  e., 
the  right  to  work  according  to  the  measure  of  force.  And 
in  such  a  purely  dynamic  equilibration,  Israel,  too,  will 
come  to  the  complete  fulfilment  of  its  mission  ;  yet  equally 
so  the  Japhetic  potentiality  of  the  world.  The  essential 
thing  of  this  union,  however,  will  be,  that  the  culture  of 
humanity  and  the  culture  of  religion  are  perfectly  recon- 
ciled with  and  vivify  each  other ;  that  the  beautiful  comes 
to  appearance  in  the  full  truth  of  the  holy,  the  holy  in  the 
full  lustre  of  the  beautiful. 

But  if  the  consummation  is  above  the  becoming,  then  the 
equilibrium  of  the  antagonism  between  the  legally  mature 
and  immature  divisions  of  the  kingdom  of  God  appears  to 
fall  awa}^  in  the  time  of  the  consummation.  And  we  shall 
surely  decline  the  prospect  which  some  ingenious  men  have 
devised,  that  the  mediaeval  Church  of  Pedagogics  and  the 
Church  of  the  Reformation  will  be  united  in  a  higher  unity. 
With  the  liberty  of  the  children  of  God,  the  law's  tutelage 

iComp.  the  article  '^Ezechiel,"  by  Baumgarten,  in  Herzog's  RealencyklopSdie. 
7ol.  iv.  p.  304.    "  Per  tot  casua,  etc..  —  in  Judaismum." 


THE   KINGDOM    OF   GOD  335 

was  done  away  already  in  the  apostolic  age.  But  even  at 
the  end  of  days,  the  reaction  of  the  Christian  kernel  of 
humanity  upon  the  whole  creatural  world  will  not  be  done 
away.  Above  all,  however,  must  the  Christian  spirit  of 
freedom  always  prove  to  be  more  than  the  spirit  of  a 
religiously  beautiful  and  elegant  training  in  the  church  it- 
self. Arbitrariness,  which  still  so  often  deports  itself  to 
excess  as  higher  evangelical  freedom,  will  disappear  ;  and, 
as  the  antitype  to  that  lay -obedience  to  the  hierarchs, 
whose  day  is  past,  a  heavenly,  free  obedience  to  the  voice 
of  God  will  find  full  realization  in  life.  SuflSce  it,  then,  for 
our  prospect,  that  we  think  of  the  life  of  the  perfected  as 
truly  festal,  but  not  idle,  still  less  aimless. 

The  central  point  of  all  Christian  hopes  is  formed  by  the 
expectation  that  the  conjunction  of  the  head  with  the  mem- 
bers, the  conjunction  of  Christ  with  the  church,  will  yet  be 
made  perfect.  And  with  reason,  for  only  in  the  head  can 
the  members  find  themselves  together.  Tliis  coming  to- 
gether is,  in  truth,  a  fundamental  article ;  but  an  article 
of  faith  which  is  intimately  connected  with  our  belief  in 
humanity,  in  humanity  as  an  organic  whole.  Thus  is  dis- 
closed the  outlook  to  the  second  appearing  of  Christ. 

With  that,  however,  the  great  macrocosmical  parables  or 
t3^pes  of  the  revelation-world,  or  Christianit}^,  will  be  ful- 
filled according  to  their  eternal  meaning  in  their  perishable 
form,  according  to  the  saying  of  the  poet,  "  All  the  perish- 
able is  only  a  parable."  As  yet  it  has  not  been  made 
evident  what  the  tree  of  life  in  the  garden  signifies,  the 
infinite  healing  virtue  in  the  holy  enjoyment  of  nature ; 
what  the  ark  signifies,  the  symbol  of  all  salvations  of  the 
higher  life  by  the  floods  of  the  ocean  ;  what  the  stars  of 
heaven  signify  for  the  seed  of  Abraham  ;  and  so  with  other 
past  and   passing   symbols.     But,  surely,  at   the  end  of 


336  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

the  world,  these  envelopes  will  be  spoken  of  with  greater 
respect ;  as  nowadays  many  speak  of  their  kernel.  Would 
we  behold  an  illustration  of  this  spiritual  resurrection  of 
all  truly  religious  elements  in  the  life  of  men,  we  need  but 
notice  the  work  of  present  philology,  in  its  interpretation 
of  the  mythological  systems  as  symbolism.  The  heathen 
mind  turned  the  symbolical  religion  into  mythology ;  the 
matured  Christian  mind  finds  again  on  the  basis  of  the 
mythology  the  symbolical  thoughts. 

As  to  what  farther  concerns  the  social  antagonism,  we 
have  repeatedly  remarked,  that  state  and  church  are  to 
become  one  in  the  kingdom  of  God.  The  state  is  not  to  be 
merged  into  the  church,  for  then  it  would  follow  that  from 
the  beginning  the  world  was  designed  to  be  disembodied 
by  a  one-sided  priesthood  at  the  altar,  or,  indeed,  to  be 
divested  of  its  many-colored  lustre  by  a  one-sided  mona- 
chism.  But  as  little  is  the  church  to  be  merged  into 
the  state ;  for,  in  that  case,  the  heaven-j^earnings  of  the 
heart  would  be  enslaved  by  the  manners  of  the  world,  the 
individual  by  the  community,  the  inner  life  by  the  appear- 
ance. Let  us,  however,  conceive  of  all  prayer-forces  and 
all  action-forces  reconciled  in  a  people  of  kings  and 
priests  ;  truly,  there  rises  a  picture  of  life,  rich  and  great, 
far  above  all  conceptions  pertaining  to  this  present  life. 

But  not  only  state  and  church,  also  heaven  and  earth, 
are  in  the  kingdom  of  God  to  come  into  unity.  This 
expectation  of  the  future  transformation  of  the  earth  into  a 
heavenly  establishment,  of  the  conjunction  of  the  spiritual 
kingdom  in  the  other  world  with  that  in  this,  nay,  of  the 
uniting  of  that  world  itself  and  this,  is  to  many  a  mere 
fancy,  — to  every  earnest  Christian,  though,  a  great  hope,  an 
assurance  of  faith,  a  certain  prediction.  We  shall  not, 
however,  stop  with  this.     The  common  anticipation  of  the 


THE   KINGDOM    OF    GOD  337 

most  important  peoples  is,  after  all,  as  fully  related  on  the 
one  side  to  reason  as  on  the  other  side  to  belief.  As  for 
the  requirements  of  reason,  the}'-  in  truth  stand  thus, 
originally.  From  the  first  tlie  thought  of  the  anticipating 
spmt  has  complained  that  the  course  of  the  world  should 
continue  on  aimless.  From  the  first  it  has  moreover 
appeared  to  the  human  intellect  an  intolerable  barrier,  that 
earth  and  heaven  should,  to  all  eternity,  communicate  onW 
by  means  of  the  elementary  light.  The  human  intellect  in 
its  youth,  rich  in  anticipation,  was  too  great  to  prepare 
itself  for  an  exclusively  terrestrial  state.  This  view  of  the 
world,  Christianity,  in  the  light  and  fire  of  revelation,  has 
purified.  And  so  to  us  the  end  of  the  world  appears  not 
merely  as  the  human,  but  also  as  the  cosmical,  realization 
of  the  internal  universality  of  Christianity.  Heaven  and 
earth  will  pass  away  as  divided  life-districts,  to  come 
together  by  a  great  metamorphosis  in  the  appearance  of 
the  city  of  God.  Yet  the  fundamental  tone  of  this  new 
world  remains  the  idea  of  glory,  of  the  perfect  lordship  of 
spirit  over  nature,  the  perfect  appearance  of  spirit  in  nature, 
the  perfect  revelation  of  spirit  through  nature.  From  this 
clear,  luminous  goal,  gleams  of  light  fall  backward  upon 
the  whole  course  of  humanity.  Of  this  significance  of  the 
world's  destination,  in  regard  to  the  fundamental  questions 
of  historical  Christianity  in  its  antecedent  condition,  in  its 
nature,  and  in  its  present  state,  something  is  yet  to  be 
said. 

We  deduce  a  conclusion,  first,  from  the  Christian  end  of 
the  world  in  regard  to  the  Christian  ground  of  the  world, 
the  creation.  If,  at  the  world-termination,  the  entire  new 
world  is  to  come  to  appearance  as  a  perfected  harmonious 
organism,  then  also  the  basis  of  the  world  must  have  been, 
or  rather  must  have  become  and  remained,  a  single  plastic, 

w 


338  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

impelling  idea.  Quite  likely  some  one  will  say  now,  —  that 
is  the  original  cell,  which,  with  the  help  of  infinite  time 
and  favorable  circumstances,  has  opened  to  the  extended 
fulness  of  the  actual  world.  But  we  come  with  our  con- 
clusion from  the  destination  of  the  world  back  to  neither 
the  luorld-egg  of  the  Indians,  nor  the  Chronos  of  the  Greeks, 
nor  the  magic  caldron  of  the  Celtic  goddess  Ceridwen,  in 
which  the  gifts  of  beauty  and  mind  were  brewed  from  the 
vapor  of  matter.  That  world-egg,  the  Indian  has  doubtless, 
by  this  time,  himself  come  to  regard  as  a  figment ;  Chronos, 
as  the  god  of  infinite  time,  has  been  deposed  by  his  son 
Zeus ;  and  the  great  magic  caldron,  with  the  contending 
forces  and  circumstances,  popular  superstition  long  since 
put  aside  in  the  Shakespearean  witch-kitchen.  The  inference 
drawn  from  a  w^orld  which,  in  its  material  consistence,  is 
thoroughly  spiritualized,  impenetrated  with  spirit,  adapted  to 
spirit,  shone  though  by  spirit,  nay,  is  made  the  organ  of  a  per- 
sonal life-kingdom,  leads  back  necessarily  to  a  homogeneous 
producer,  to  the  Logos,  wherein  Spirit  itself,  as  the  omnip- 
otent, personal  formative  principle,  is  first,  and  the  breath 
of  the  Word,  the  originating  appearance,  matter,  is  second. 
For  that  matter,  which  at  the  end  of  things  has  to  prove 
the  servant  of  all  servants  (servus  servorum), — that  this 
at  the  beginning  was  a  lord  of  all  lords,  the  father  of 
spirit,  appears  to  us  as  simply  an  absurdity.  Such  a 
self-denial  as  is  ascribed  to  this  all-the-world's  servant, 
that  he  "  who  perfects  all  this  grandeur  "  has  alwaj^s  made 
himself  subject  to  all  things,  nay,  has  hid  himself  behind 
all  things  or  forms  of  life,  —  so  completel}^  hid  himself  that 
no  man  ever  has  seen  or  can  see  so  much  as  a  single  atom 
(for  the  elements,  as  such,  are  a  long  way  from  being  atoms 
and  molecules), —  far  surpasses  the  Christian  measure  of  self- 
denial.     Aristotle  and  Plato  were  likewise  unable  to  under- 


THE    KINGDOM    OF   GOD  389 

stand  how  matter  could  have  proceeded  from  spirit,  its 
life  and  its  plastic  energy  ;  but  they  were,  nevertheless,  too 
clear  thinkers  to  attribute  to  that  unconscious  something 
lying  behind  phenomena,  and  to  be  apprehended  only  by 
the  touch,  any  mastery.  Had  matter  conjured  up  the 
beautiful  world,  then  we  should  have  respecting  the  world 
no  other  prophecy  than  the  prognostic  of  the  gambler, 
Lightly  come,  lightly  go  !  He  who,  therefore,  would  bring 
spirit  ultimately  to  absolute  rule  can  only  rely  with  hope 
on  the  assurance,  In  the  beginning  was  the  Word. 

Now,  if  the  creation,  as  likewise  the  basis  of  the  eter- 
nal spiritual  world,  was  in  principle  consummated  with  the 
existence  of  the  first  man,  then  we  could  not  expect  to  find 
any  miracle,  that  is  to  say,  any  absolutely  new  form  of  life, 
in  the  history  of  the  world.  The  grain  of  the  harvest,  as 
the  new  miracle  in  the  ear,  will  admit  of  reference  to  the 
first  miracle  only,  to  the  seed  which  lay  at  the  basis  of  the 
harvest ;  yet  during  the  wliole  period  of  its  development 
the  seed  has  disappeared  as  completely  as  if  it  were  lost. 
Accordingly^,  those  who  do  not  recognize  in  the  history  of  the 
world,  or  in  the  life  of  Christ,  an  epoch  entirely  homogen- 
eous with  the  epoch  at  the  beginning  and  the  epoch  at  the 
end  of  the  world,  of  equally  heavenly  height,  have  to  tax 
their  ingenuity  in  many  ways  to  ground  the  notion  of  mi- 
raculous events  inside  a  purely  periodic  course  of  the  mun- 
dane life ;  conceive  they,  then,  of  the  work  of  Christ  in  a 
Jewish-Christian  foshion,  as  a  legal  reform,  or  in  a  Gentile- 
Christian  fashion,  as  a  new  school  of  life.  But  as  the  Old 
Testament  justly  postulates  a  great  turning-point,  a  new 
miraculous  epoch  inside  the  history  of  creation,  over 
against  the  genesis  of  light,  the  genesis  of  the  first  man, 
the  concrete  spiritual  light-bearer ;  so  the  New  Testament 
also  supposes  an  equally,  and  even  a  more  important  turn- 


340  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

ing-point  within  the  history  of  mankind,  —  a  turning-point 
which  forms  the  basis  of  the  redemption  of  humanity  from 
its  bondage  to  sin,  in  abnormal  development.  The  Apostle 
John  has  denoted  it  by  the  expression,  "  The  Word  was 
made  flesh ;  '*  the  Apostle  Paul  by  the  expression,  "  The 
first  man  is  of  the  earth,  earthy ;  the  second  man  is  the 
Lord  from  heaven."  By  the  earthy  man,  he  understands 
always,  not  a  sinful  man,  but  human  nature  in  its  psychical, 
corporeo-spiritual  endowment,  from  which  the  spirit  could 
have  unfolded  as  naturally  as  the  red  flower  unfolds  from 
the  green  stalk  and  leaf;  which,  however,  through  abnor- 
mal self-determination,  entangled  itself  in  the  bonds  of  a 
false  demoniaco-spiritual  carnality,  and  so  developed  down- 
ward to  death.  Yet  the  second  man,  since  he  is  in  his  advent 
mediated,  received,  but  not  produced,  by  the  first  human- 
ity in  its  higher  features,  signifies  the  human  endowment  in 
its  realized  and  universal  potentiality,  a  quite  heavenly  new 
birth,  which  is  in  its  nature  already  the  principle  of  regen- 
eration for  the  whole  Adamic  world.  The  antagonism 
between  Adam  and  Christ  is  the  antagonism  of  the  merely 
pure  and  the  purified,  absolutely  potential,  spirituo-corpo- 
real  endowment.  Hence  it  is  as  incorrect  to  say,  Christ 
took  the  paradisaic  human  nature,  as  to  say  he  sanctified 
in  his  person  the  sinful  human  nature.  Rather  does  he 
enter  upon  his  way  with  a  sanctified  nature,  and  on  just 
that  account  is  he  able  to  experience  by  his  perfect  sympa- 
thy, and  overcome  all  the  temptations  of  humanity.  To 
such  an  epoch  in  principle,  to  such  a  seed  of  the  thoroughly 
spiritualized  and  deified  human  life,  the  world's  destination, 
as  we  have  apprehended  it,  refers.  We  go  back,  therefore, 
from  the  idea  of  a  world  ruled  by  Spirit,  and  consequently 
filled  with  God,  first  of  all,  not  to  Adam,  but  to  Christ,  the 
God-man  and  personal  Author  of  the  whole  new  world,  as 


THE   KINGDOM   OF   GOD  341 

he  is  not  merely  Redeemer  of  the  old  world,  bnt  also  Re- 
newer  of  the  old  world  and  Finisher  of  the  new.  But  then 
this  conclusion  follows :  As  unique  and  as  high  and  as 
miraculous  as  was  the  creational  foundation  of  the  world, 
and  as  the  new  world  in  its  entire  periphery  is  to  be ;  so 
unique,  so  high,  and  so  miraculous  must  have  been  also  the 
life  of  Christ  in  the  midst  of  the  providential  history,  or 
the  history  of  the  world.  When  I  draw  a  line  from  the 
miraculous  summit  of  the  creation  to  the  miraculous  sum- 
mit of  the  world's  consummation,  it  must  touch  the  crown 
of  the  life  of  Christ ;  in  other  words,  whatever  is  detracted 
from  the  life  of  Christ,  that  is  detracted  from  the  hope  of 
all  mankind  as  to  the  consummation.  If,  however,  any  one 
should  deem  a  single  life  too  limited  to  form  the  basis  of  the 
new  world,  he  forgets  that  it  is  the  nature  of  humanity, 
even  over  against  the  manifoldness  of  the  world,  to  con- 
centrate and  creatively  to  regenerate  itself  in  a  few  great 
personalities  ;  that,  however,  the  one  humanit}^  over  against 
the  one  God,  had  to  sum  itself  up  in  one  human  Head,  in 
one  Head  in  whom  God  imparts  and  surrenders  himself  to 
it,  and  in  whom  it  is  to  impart  and  surrender  itself  to  him. 
Finally,  we  come  to  the  question,  what  the  idea  of  the 
kingdom  of  God  in  its  consummation  has  to  tell  us  regard- 
ing our  own  times.  Let  us  notice,  in  the  first  place,  the 
universal  mundane  life.  If  it  is  certain,  then,  that  we 
await  new  heavens  and  a  new  earth,  wherein  dwelleth 
righteousness ;  wherein  Spirit  in  all  its  glorj^  rules  over 
and  through  nature,  things,  matter ;  wherein  the  Personal 
World  has  completely  appropriated  to  itself  the  impersonal 
world,  —  then  we  can  regard  even  the  restless  conquest  of 
the  woild  by  science,  industrj^  mechanics,  and  action  for 
the  service  of  the  spirit  in  general  as  only  a  beautiful  way 
of  the  future.     Looking,  however,  sharply  at  the  goal,  we 


342  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

cannot  fail  to  perceive  the  danger  that  the  means  will  bej 
as  it  is,  made  the  end  ;  that  countless  personalities  will,  as 
they  do,  in  struggling  with  the  impersonal,  lose  themselves 
deep  in  the  impersonal.  Materialism  is  the  name  for  the 
extreme  degree  of  this  aberration  in  its  theoretical  and 
practical  form.  But  when  we  remember  that  matter  is 
destined  to  be  the  rich  attire  of  spirit,  as  humanity  is 
destined  to  be  the  bride  of  Christ,  we  could  wish  for  the 
present  times,  instead  of  a  coarse  cultus,  a  finer  culture  of 
matter.  Why,  if  matter  is  to  be  accounted  a  beneficent 
deity,  is  it  in  so  many  ways,  then,  made  a  fiery  Moloch, 
which  with  more  and  more  frightful  signs  consumes  houses, 
ships,  and  men  ?  Surely,  in  place  of  the  fantastic  deifica- 
tion of  matter,  there  must  come  in  infinitely  greater 
respect  for  its  spiritually  fine  laws,  according  to  which 
medicines  can  be  changed  into  poisons,  and  poisons  into 
medicines.  And  now  as  to  the  dignity  of  spirit,  true 
spirit  is  personal  spirit,  the  bloom  of  the  soul-life  and 
heart  which  are  open  to  God  and  his  heaven,  and  not  a 
tissue  of  thought-creations  which  have  separated  them- 
selves from  love,  from  the  hearth  of  the  personal  life.  In 
these  days,  however,  such  is  the  false  spiritualization  of 
the  spiritual  life  that  many  find  more  of  divine  revelation 
in  the  pulsing  of  a  nightingale  than  in  the  pulsing  of  a 
choice  human  heart,  and,  in  the  end,  more  in  the  character- 
istic of  a  stone  than  in  the  singing  of  the  nightingale. 
But  if  Japheth  could  disrupt  the  connection  with  Shem,  his 
spiritual  conquest  of  the  world  would  become  a  wild  and 
disorderly  hunting  of  external  observations  in  an  endless 
labyrinth  of  unique  particulars,  or  analytical  notices.  But 
the  prospect  of  the  consummation  of  the  kingdom  of  God 
assures  us,  that,  in  the  kernel  of  humanity,  the  tendency 


THE   KINGDOM    OF   GOD  343 

of  the  spirit  to  abide  in  God  will  be  made  prevalent  over 
its  tendency  to  traverse  the  world. 

We  close  with  a  look  at  ecclesiastical  relations.  Obvi- 
ously, from  the  prospect  which  believing  Christendom  has 
of  an  organic  and  free  consummation  of  the  kingdom  of 
God,  there  is  to  be  in  our  day,  or  the  not  distant  future,  a 
reconstruction  of  the  ecclesiastic  social  life.  It  is  true,  the 
fulness  of  the  developed  intellectual  life,  of  personal  faith, 
of  moral  endeavors,  is  a  spiritual  power  which  can  no 
longer  be  confined  within  the  old  massive  or  stiff  and  uni- 
form forms,  be  they  called  popedom,  Caesaro-papacy,  or 
state-church  and  pastoral  tutelage  of  the  spiritual  life. 
The  spirit  must  have  more  vent,  —  forsooth,  the  true  spirit, 
not  the  pseudo-spirit  which  would  conjure  up  a  new  vox 
Dei  from  the  voting  of  the  masses,  which  with  its  ecclesi- 
astic ideals  has  sunken  below  the  level  of  the  state  ;  —  as 
this  must,  indeed,  recognize  under  moral  conditions  re- 
ligious freedom,  but  with  every  recognition  of  a  religious 
community  must  also  inquire  into  its  statutes,  and  can 
never  connect  itself  with  an  unbound  community  which 
will  know  of  no  obligatory  principles,  but  only  of  unfettered 
opinions.  For  it  is  desired  to  make  the  variable,  infinitely 
seducible  majority-vote  of  all  religious,  moral,  and  intel- 
lectual idiots  the  guardian  of  all  that  in  the  Christian  life  of 
faith,  knowledge,  and  sentiment  has  become  ripe  in  our 
age ;  and  this  organization  of  the  Christian  spiritual  life 
from  below  up  is  to  be  the  new  Reform,  the  Reformation 
of  the  Reformation.  Still,  even  such  a  tendency,  as  it 
announces  itself  in  the  Protestant  Union,  may  have  given 
to  it  by  the  state  its  share  of  vent  and  motion.  Wholly 
new,  however,  and  more  than  naive,  is  the  expectation  that 
the  church  founded  upon  the  Evangelical  Confession  is  to 
surrender  its  confession-obligation,  or  rather  its  confession- 


344  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

right,  is  to  abandon  its  old  storm-proved  ship  on  which  it 
is  sailing  to  meet  the  coming  of  the  Lord,  in  order  to  drift 
aimlessly  away  upon  a  loosely  constructed  raft.  But  as 
this  expectation  is  only  an  idle  whim,  and  as  from  respect 
to  the  persons  we  must  suppose  they  can  no  longer  recede, 
the  programme  of  the  immediate  future  is  indicated.  The 
state  must  set  the  church  at  liberty,  and  not  with  base  in- 
gratitude for  the  services  received  from  it ;  in  any  case, 
with  honest  perception  of  its  rights.  The  state  must 
help  it  to  a  constitution  corresponding  to  its  principles. 
Then,  on  the  right  and  on  the  left,  a  broad  channel 
may  be  set  off;  here  the  church  bound  by  authority,  there 
the  overfree  tendency  of  a  societ}^  loosed  from  the  authority 
of  the  Scriptures,  confessions,  and  church-regulations ;  the 
middle  and  deep  ground-current  of  the  church  of  the  evan- 
gelical confession  will  remain  powerful  enough  to  move 
festally  on  to  the  ocean  of  the  Christian  consummation  of 
the  world,  a  consummation  in  which  the  majestic  glory 
of  Christ  is  to  appear  in  the  closest  connection  with  the 
moral  beauty  of  his  church.  When,  therefore,  we  hear,  in 
our  day,  the  loud  and  over-loud  watchword  in  the  church, 
Freedom,  Freedom  !  we  join  in,  Y^es,  freedom,  freedom  for 
YOU ;  but  freedom  also  for  us ! 


LECTURE  X 
CHRISTIANITY  AND   CULTURE 

By  REV.  JULIUS  DISSELHOFF 

PASTOR  AND   INSPECTOR   AT   KAISERSWERTH 


REV.  JULIUS  DISSELHOFF 


BIOGRAPHICAL 


Rev.  Julius  Disselhoff,  author  of  the  last  lecture  in  this  vol- 
ume, was  born  at  Soest,  November  20,  1827.  He  is  reported  to 
have  died  during  the  past  year,  or  in  1896.  His  lecture  on 
"Christianity  and  Culture"  shows  him  to  have  been  a  very 
widely  informed  scholar,  wiih  no  little  special  knowledge  re- 
specting the  topic  considered.  He  was  also  a  careful  and  judi- 
cious critic  all  along  the  line  of  the  different  factors  having  to 
do  with  culture  ;  and  with  peculiar  abiHty  does  he  show  how 
these  factors  produce  different  results  when  influenced  by  Chris- 
tianity and  when  not  so  influenced.  His  address  is  a  fitting 
conclusion  to  the  others  in  the  volume,  inasmuch  as  it  exhibits 
the  last  great  battle  between  faith  and  unbelief — the  battle  of 
culture  joined  with  religion  and  of  culture  wholly  separated 
from  the  influences  of  at  least  all  revealed  knowledge  of  God 
and  the  hereafter. 


SUMMARY  OF  LEOTUEE  X 


The  subject  is  so  extensive,  preliminary  discussions  must  be 
omitted — By  Christianity  we  understand  a  religion  that  is  posi- 
tively biblical,  and  by  culture  the  development  of  the  human 
powers  as  far  as  they  have  reference  to  this  life — The  word  cul- 
ture relates  to  the  term  cultus,  as  of  like  root  with  it — The  cul- 
ture of  the  Egyptians,  Babylonians,  etc.,  attracts  us  not,  because 
their  cultus  does  not  attract  us — It  was  first  in  Greece  and  Rome 
that  men  began  to  call  upon  deity  as  a  free  personality — The 
admired  classical  culture  of  these  two  ancient  peoples  has  its 
root  in  their  religious  cultus — But  in  the  very  bloom  of  this 
ancient  culture  a  barbarism  is  seen,  principles  which  are  the 
contradiction  of  culture— Neither  the  Greeks  nor  the  Romans 
had  a  correct  idea  of  personality,  or  of  marriage  and  the  house- 
hold relation,  or  of  the  State— Singing  and  music  were  scarcely 
known  among  these  peoples— In  their  architecture  matter  is  not 
conquered  by  the  spirit ;  and  in  their  sculpture  the  despotic 
power  of  fate  appears  to  the  beholder,  or  in  it  is  concealed  very 
often  a  corrupting  influence— In  ancient  poetry  there  is  found 
nowhere  a  reconciliation  of  the  person— These  ancients  did  not 
have  even  the  suspicion  of  a  real  science  of  history— Roman 
jurisprudence  neither  gave  rights  to  other  peoples  nor  could  save 
Rome  from  moral  barbarism— The  fundamental  condition  of 
cultured  life  was  not  held  fast  by  either  Plato  or  Aristotle— Only 
in  Christianity  do  we  have  the  true  conception  of  personality, 
the  divine  and  the  human— Christianity  alone  provides  rightly 
for  marriage  and  the  family,  for  genuine  political  organization, 
and  for  the  relation  between  labor  and  rest— The  various  factors 
of  civilization  as  affected  by  Christianity  during  the  last  one 
thousand  years— Schiller,  in  his  poem  entitled  ''The  Walk," 
puts  forward  the  idea  that  all  our  present  civilization  must  end 
in  barbarism,  and  thus  become  rejuvenated ;  but  we  know  a 
better  remedy  and  a  better  preservative  power,  namely,  Christ, 
who  is  the  Life  and  the  Light  of  men. 


CHRISTIANITY  AND  CULTURE 
BY   REV.   JULIUS   DISSELHOFIT', 

PASTOR  AND  INSPECTOR  AT  KAISERSWERTH 

y^HRISTIANITY  and  Culture,  — that  is  the  subject 
1  I  I  which  is  now  to  come  before  us.  It  is  so  extensive, 
\^J^  that,  to  make  the  most  of  m}^  time,  I  must  ask  per- 
w  mission  not  to  detain  yon  with  preliminar}'  discus- 
sions. Only  be  it  in  a  word  remarked,  that  I  understand 
by  Christianity  a  religion  positively  Biblical^  and  bj^  culture 
the  care  and  development  of  man's  essential  powers  and 
gifts,  so  far  as  they  have  reference  to  this  life.  The  unfold- 
ing of  individual  talents,  as  it  is  only  a  partial,  will  ever  be 
a  one-sided  and  imperfect  culture  ;  the  harmonious  unfold- 
ing of  all  human  talents  to  one  whole  can  only  be  regarded 
as  genuine  culture. 

My  lecture  will  be  occupied  chiefly  with  facts,  —  facts 
which  speak  eloquently  in  the  way  of  demonstration.  I 
might,  accordingly,  state  the  question  thus  :  — 

What  does  universal  Jiistory  teach  us  respecting  the  influ- 
ence of  Christianity  on  Culture? 

You  all  are  sensible  of  the  importance  of  this  question 
as  related  to  the  present  ;  for  in  it  two  views  of  life 
struggle  for  the  victory.     One,  the   Christian,  adheres  to 

the  conviction,  that  only  by  the  self-revelation  and  self- 

349 


350  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

impartation  of  God  in  Christ  can  humanity  attain  its  end. 
The  other,  the  so-called  humane^  emancipates  itself  from 
the  revelation  of  God  in  the  Holy  Scriptures,  and  asserts 
that  humanity  unfolds  itself  of  itself  even  to  consumma- 
tion. At  the  same  time,  this  doctrine  of  humanity  claims 
that  it  alone  civilizes  man,  defames  Christianity  as  an  enemy 
of  culture,  and  gives  it  the  advice  to  be  transformed  into 
harmony  with  the  spirit  of  the  times,  by  the  advanced 
views  of  the  century. 

From  the  troubled  party-confusion  of  the  present,  let  us 
flee  to  impartial  universal  history,  and,  as  humble,  truth- 
loving  disciples,  hear  her  decision  on  that  assertion  and 
accusation  of  humanism. 

Our  preceptress  must  lead  us,  first,  into  the  history  of 
the  culture  antecedent  to  Christ,  so  that,  having  learned 
what  man  was  able  to  achieve  b}^  himself,  we  shall  be  pre- 
pared to  estimate  the  influence  exerted  on  culture  by  Chris- 
tianit3^ 

The  word  culture  refers  us  to  the  word  cuUus,  as  of  like 
root  with  it.  The  language-forming  popular  mind,  then, 
which  has  made  or  appropriated  these  two  words,  considers 
cultus  and  culture  to  be  cognate.  In  other  words,  the 
voice  of  the  people  declares  that  the  right  care  or  service 
of  deity,  and  the  right  care  of  human  endowments  and 
relations,  are  vitall}^  connected.^ 

Those  peoples  which  have  no  cultus.  with  whom  the  con- 
sciousness that  deity  and  humanity  are  essentially  related, 
are  reduced  to  a  minimum,  perhaps  to  fetichism  or  belief  in 
spectres,  —  such  peoples  have  no  culture.  All  peoples,  on 
the  other  hand,  which  lead  a  civilized  life,  are  also  cherish- 

1  The  Scripture  narrates,  it  is  true,  that,  in  the  race  of  the  God-forgetting  Cain- 
Ites,  heginnings  of  culture,  city-builders,  pipers,  and  harpers  made  their  appear- 
ance; but  it  causes  to  be  seen,  lik3V7ise,  with  what  barbarism  of  the  spirit  thia 
culture  was  united. 


CHRISTIANITY    AND   CULTURE  351 

ers  of  the  organic  connection  existing  between  man  and 
deity. 

The  culture  of  the  oldest  historic  peoples,  the  Egyptians, 
Babylonians,  Assyrians,  and  Medo-Persians,  attracts  us 
not,  because  their  cultus  does  not  attract  us.  They  were 
servilely  given  to  the  worship  of  the  powers  of  nature, 
which,  with  unbroken,  despotic  might,  ruled  over  them. 
Bondage,  despotism,  is  also  the  character  of  their  culture, 
whether  we  view  their  social  and  political  institutions,  or 
the  architecture  and  sculpture  they  have  left. 

Not  until  in  Greece,  and  still  later  in  Rome,  the  rudest 
cultus  of  the  powers  of  nature  was  overcome,  and  men 
began  to  call  upon  deity  as  a  free  personality,  did  there 
bloom  in  all  fields  of  human  life  a  culture  from  which  we 
at  this  day  learn.  It  is  an  undisputed  fact,  that  the 
admired,  classical  culture  has  its  root  in  a  religious  cul- 
tus ;  that  especially  the  life-connection  between  deity  and 
humanity  is  the  source  of  the  classical  art.  Take  deity 
away,  and  Homer  and  Hesiod,  Pindar  and  Herodotus, 
Aeschjdus  and  Sophocles,  are  phantoms ;  and  that  power 
which  built  the  Parthenon,  cast  the  image  of  Pallas 
Athene,  and  chiselled  that  of  Jupiter  Olympus,  is  cut 
through,  veins  and  nerves.  It  is  a  fact,  as  universally 
admitted,  that  the  culture  of  classic  antiquity  flourished 
onl}^  so  long  as  the  life  of  the  people  was  pervaded  by 
reverence  for  personal  divinity.  When  piet}-  disappeared, 
—  and  it  had  to  disappear,  because  the  ancient  gods  were 
not  truth  and  life ;  when  philosophy  overthrew  the  old 
popular  religion  without  being  able  to  put  in  its  place  a 
better ;  when  thus  God-estrangement,  eclaircissement,  and 
Pyrrhonism  attained  rule,  —  then  entered  into  the  cultural 
life  a  process  of  decomposition  that  rapidly  and  irremedi- 
ably bore  the  Greek,  and  also  the  Roman,  body-politic  on 


352  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

towards  putrefaction,  which  an  Aristophanes  in  Greece, 
and  even  a  Horace  in  Rome,  plainly  and  strongly  enough 
have  declared.*  The  particular  features  of  this  picture  of 
corruption,  it  is  not  the  province  of  my  lecture  to  describe. 
Besides,  they  are  in  part  so  repulsive  and  unclean,  that  1 
should  here  have  to  cast  the  veil  over  them.  But  the  fact 
must  be  emphasized,  that  the  Greek  and  Roman  popular, 
minds  were  not  in  a  condition  to  produce  an  abiding  cul- " 
ture,  nay,  that  at  the  very  heights  of  their  cultures  internal 
decomposition  announced  certain  death,  —  which  thought- 
ful historians,  like  Thucydides  and  Livy,  by  no  means  con- 
cealed from  themselves  and  their  contemporaries.^ 

Still  more.  Even  the  bloom  of  the  ancient  culture  we 
behold  affected  with  unculture,  nay,  even  with  barbarism. 
It  is  on  the  whole  only  a  commencement  of  culture,  or, 
better,  a  beautiful  and  noble  attempt  towards  culture. 
Only  by  those  who  are  not  acquainted  with  it,  and  who 
substitute   for   the    facts    their  own    fancies,   can    it    be 

1  The  real  pulse-stroke  of  all  the  comedies  of  Aristophanes  is  the  conviction 
that  the  departure  from  faith  in  a  personal  deity  and  the  predominance  of 
rationalism  was  the  poison  which  spoiled  in  the  kernel  all  the  relations  of 
Grecian  life.  It  is  well  known  with  what  energy  he  exposes  and  satirizes  the 
internal  barharism  of  his  brilliant  age;  it  should,  however,  never  be  forgotten 
that  he  looks  upon  the  decay  of  piety  as  the  source  of  the  decay  of  culture.  As 
familiar  is  the  ode  of  Horace  (lib.  iii.  6)  in  which  the  same  view  obtains.  Comp., 
also,  Odes,  lib.  l.  35,  33-38;  in.  5,  29;  ii.  15,  etc. 

2  Thucydides  portrays,  e.g.,  in.  82,  83,  the  internal  corruption  of  the  Athenian 
state  in  his  splendid  day.  "  The  ordinary  meaning  of  words  was  changed,  and 
associations  were  formed,  not  to  gain  the  benefit  of  established  laws,  but  for 
selfish  purposes  in  opposition  to  those  institutions.  The  assurance  of  mutual 
fidelity  rested  not  so  much  on  the  divine  law  as  on  the  common  participancy  in 
crime,"  etc.  The  Inevitable  fall  of  the  Athenian  state  which  Thucydides  foresaw, 
he  ascribes  not  to  assaults  upon  it  by  wars,  but  to  divine  agency  (ii.  64).  Livy 
Bays  of  his  day,  that  the  Roman  state  suffered  from  its  own  greatness ;  that  long 
already  the  energies  of  the  excessively  strong  nation  had  been  destroying  them- 
selves ;  that  the  Roman  people  could  endure  neither  its  vices  nor  their  remedies ; 
that  the  desire  reigned  by  excess  and  sensuality  to  go  to  ruin  and  to  ruin  every* 
thing.    (Preface.) 


CHRISTIANITY    AND   CULTURE  353 

admired  to  deification.  Very  much  did  the  Greek  and 
Roman  culture  lack  of  being  true  and  complete.  There 
were,  in  the  ancient  life,  principles  which  are  the  contra- 
diction of  culture.  Let  us  consider,  first  of  all,  the  human 
personality.  According  to  the  ancient  view,  only  the 
man  is  the  full  and  real  man.  The  woman  stands  far 
below  him,  so  far  that  even  an  Iphigenia,  who  is  willing  to 
sacrifice  herself  for  her  countr}^,  justifies  her  act  of  love  b}^ 
saying,  "  For  one  man  is  better  than  ten  thousand  women, 
that  he  should  see  the  light."  The  entire  one  half  of 
mankind  is,  then,  theoretically  put  down  and  hindered 
from  bringing  to  development  the  germ  which  is  in  their 
natures.  Neither  is  every  man  a  real,  full  man,  but  onlj- 
the  free  man.  The  slave  is,  not  merely  as  to  his  external 
and  social  position,  but  in  his  nature,  a  less  important 
being.  And,  again,  not  every  free  man  is  the  full  man, 
but  only  the  Greek  and  the  Roman.  All  others  are 
barbarians,  even  though  the}-  worship  the  same  God,  and 
possess  the  same  civilization.  On  this  point,  the  classical 
culture  was  unable  to  rise  higher  than  that  of  the  Chinese, 
to  whom  we  are  "  red-bristled  barbarians,"  or  that  of  the 
Esquimaux,  who  call  only  themselves  innuit,  i.  e.,  man. 
Because  full  worthiness  does  not  dwell  in  the  woman,  she 
is  consequently  not  the  equal  of  man ;  and  so  there  can  be 
no  true  conjugal  love,  no  true  marriage,  no  real  family- 
life. 

The  most  ideal  womanly  figure  of  classic  antiquity  is 
the  Antigone  of  Sophocles,  who,  from  obedience  to  the 
eternal  law  of  Zeus,  does  not  fear  death.  But  how  triflingly 
even  she  judges  of  marriage  and  the  familj'-relation,  of 
wedded  and  of  parental  love,  may  be  perceived  from  the 
following  words  (v.  896  et  seq.)  :  "  Never  would  I  for  a 
child  that  I  have  borne,  nor  for  my  husband,  were  he  dead 


354  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

and  turned  to  dust,  have  undertaken  such  a  risk,  the  state 
opposed.  One  husband  dying,  I  another  might  have  found, 
and,  my  child  lost,  another  from  another  man." 

From  what  has  been  already  said  it  follows  that  the 
ancient  state  could  never  give  to  two  classes  of  its  mem- 
\)ers,  the  woman  and  the  slave,  the  cultivation  to  which 
each  is  by  essential  nature  adapted.  As  little  could  it  at- 
tain, as  a  whole,  the  culture  to  which  the  political  commu- 
nity is  summoned,  since  on  principle  it  shut  out  from  its 
fellowship  other  popular  communities  as  barbarian,  using 
them  only  as  means  for  its  egotism.  It  made  itself  a  des- 
pot, the  peoples  slavish  instruments  of  its  purposes.  While 
in  Rome  culture  seemingly  flourished,  the  circle  of  the 
world  groaned  under  the  tread  of  the  Roman  tyranny. 
"What  we  call  in  state-life  barbarism,  was  the  principle, 
the  maxim,  of  the  state. 

I  take  you  to  the  province  of  ancient  art.  Its  form  is  in 
many  respects  to  this  day  law  for  us.  But  it  is  far  distant 
from  the  goal.  Singing  and  music,  according  to  our  ideas, 
were  hardly  known.  Were  Roman  and  Greek  singers  now 
to  strike  up  their  art  in  our  hearing,  we  should,  I  fear,  not 
stay  long,  and  be  able  to  ascribe  to  these  peoples  scarcely 
the  elements  of  a  musical  cultivation.  I  pass  by  Greek 
and  Roman  painting,  because  I  have  had  no  opportunity  of 
becoming  especially  acquainted  with  it,  and  therefore  am 
not  qualified  to  pass  judgment  on  it.  But  before  the  most 
celebrated  remains  of  ancient  architecture  I  have  admir- 
ingly stood.  In  the  ruins  of  the  temples  at  Athens, 
Ephesus,  and  Baalbeck,  impressions  of  glory  and  harmony 
flooded  me  which  I  am  unable  to  put  in  words.  I  was  as  if 
overpowered.  However,  as  finished  and  agreeable  as  are 
the  proportions,  the  matter,  the  marble,  is  after  all  not  con 
quered  by  the  spirit.     Every  column   stands   isolated  by 


CHRISTIANITY    AND   CULTURE  355 

itself;  when  the  e^-e  has  coursed  up  its  finished  form  to  the 
capital,  then  between  column  and  column  lies  the  horizontal 
line  of  the  marble  architrave,  like  an  unbroken  barrier,  to 
arrest  the  flight  of  the  spirit  and  precipitate  it  back  to  the 
earth.  Still  more  sensible  is  the  barrier  behind  the  row  of 
columns,  where  the  eye  falls  upon  the  wall  of  the  temple 
proper.  Marble  block  rises  above  marble  block,  and  forms 
a  dead  wall.  And  in  the  temple,  —  a  dark  room,  four  mar- 
ble walls,  —  scarcely  an  attempt  to  breathe  into  the  inter- 
nal structure  an  idea. 

Touching  the  perfection  of  form  in  the  ancient  sculpture, 
as,  e.  g.,  in  the  groups  of  Niobe  and  Laocoon,  or  the  statues 
of  Apollo  Belvedere,  the  Medicean  Venus,  etc.,  on  whose 
beauty  I  at  several  times  and  leisurely  was  permitted  with 
the  deepest  interest  to  gaze,  I  need  not  lose  a  word.  But 
the  artists  of  the  line  and  our  own  feeling  tell  us  that  in 
those  groups  the  despotic  power  of  fate,  which  makes  of 
man  a  repining  slave,  still  oppresses  even  the  beholder  ;  and 
those  statues  attest  to  us  that  the  cultus  of  beautiful  form 
can  produce  beautiful  forms,  but  they  also  show  that  this 
cultus  onl}'  poorly  conceals  a  corrupting  cultural  life. 

The  ancient  poetry  exhibits  to  us  a  noble  struggle  for 
personal  freedom  and  free  unity  with  deity.  But  internal 
reconciliation  is  nowhere  found.  The  free  life  in  a  God 
who  is  holy  love,  and  who  guides  the  life  of  the  individual 
and  of  the  communit}^  throws  not  its  transfiguring  rays 
upon  the  creations  of  poesy.  Deep,  internal  dissension 
comes  clamorously  forth.  Even  an  Antigone,  who,  as  we 
have  already  mentioned,  obeys  deity  rather  than  human 
statutes,  could  not  find  peace  in  her  divinity,  but  ends  in 
despair.  From  all  tlie  classic  poetry,  again  and  again, 
breaks  forth  the  old  sigh  wiiich  Homer  represents  Zeus  him- 
self as  uttering  over  "  unfortunate  man"  (Iliad,  xvii.  446)  : 


356  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

**  For  the  race  of  mortal  men, 
Of  all  that  breathe  and  move  upon  the  earth, 
Is  the  most  wretched ; "  ^ 

or  the  hopeless  creed  of  Achilles,  with  which  the  Iliad  closes 
(xxiv.  525)  :  — 

"The  Gods  ordain 
The  lot  of  man  to  suffer,  while  themselves 
Are  free  from  care."* 

Lastly,  a  few  words  respecting  the  ancient  science.  Of 
a  real  science  of  history,  of  a  history  of  mankind,  the 
ancients  could  have  had  not  even  a  suspicion ;  for  they  knew 
no  human  race  which  is  a  unity  and  summoned  to  develop- 
ment, a  race  which  branches  out  into  peoples  that  serve  the 
general  development  according  to  the  measure  of  their  gifts. 
They  knew  only  Greeks  and  Barbarians.  The  fundamental 
condition  of  a  science  of  history,  consequently,  was  wanting 
to  them. 

The  Roman  jurisprudence  is  certainly  a  noble  production 
of  culture.  But  it  neither  gave  rights  to  the  non-Roman 
peoples  as  over  against  their  oppressors,  nor  was  able  to 
save  Rome  itself  from  moral  barbarism.  As  with  us  many 
visit  the  comedy  for  a  pastime,  so  at  Rome  the  rich  and 
the  poor,  males  and  females,  streamed  into  the  amphi- 
theatre, and  delighted  their  eyes  with  the  horrible  spectacle 
pas  wild  beasts  lacerated  and  ale  slaves  and  condemned 
persons,  and  among  them  many  Christian  men  and  women, 
—  a  horrible  amusement. 

And  the  philosophy  in  fine  ?  How  little  even  the  deepest 
and  most  ideal,  the  sharpest  and  clearest  thinkers  of  Greece 
were  able  of  themselves  to  apprehend  and  hold  fast  the 
fundamental  conditions  of  cultural  life,  Plato  and  Aristotle 
show  incontestably.   Plato,  who  has  been  called  the  divine^ 

i  Bryant's  Translation,  xvii.  537-539.  *  From  the  same,  XXIV.  661-663. 


CHRISTIANITY    AND   CULTURE  857 

sees,  precisely  at  that  time  when  in  him  and  Aristotle  the 
Greek  philosophy  had  culminated,  that  his  nation,  if  it  con- 
tinued living  under  the  old  relations,  was  lost.  In  his 
political  philosophy  he  proffers  his  nation  the  safety-anchor. 
And  what  is  the  safety-anchor?  The  forces  in  which  the 
bloom  of  Greece  consisted,  such  as  poetry,  indeed  all  art  in 
general,  is  banished,  or  is  deprived  of  its  living  soul.  On 
the  other  hand,  matters  antagonistic  in  principle  to  cul- 
ture are  immortalized  and  held  forth  as  the  sources  of 
salvation.  There  is  established  a  qualitative  difference 
among  men  ;  marriage  and  the  family  relation  are  abolished  ; 
a  man  is  no  longer  to  have  his  own  wife,  and  the  father  and 
the  mother  no  longer  their  children ;  but  the  women  and 
children  belong  to  the  whole  political  community  (v.  8,  9, 
12).  Weakly  and  physically  defective  children  must  be 
put  out  of  the  way  (iii.  15  ;  v.  8,  9).  Whereby  not  only 
the  human,  but  also  the  free  male  personality  is  totally  an- 
nihilated. For  the  model  kings  in  the  model  state,  decep- 
tion, as  a  holy,  wise,  and  necessary  means  of  ruling,  is  made 
a  duty  (ill.  3,  21  ;  v.  8,  et  al.).  Valiant  young  men  who 
have  served  their  country  well,  receive  as  a  reward  for 
their  deeds,  on  the  state's  account,  unlimited  permission 
to  indulgence  in  the  foul,  shameful  passion  which  forms  the 
most  disgraceful  stain  in  the  Grecian  popular  life  (v.  14).^ 
Ai-istotle  combats,  it  is  true,  Plato's  theory  about  the 
community  of  women  and  children ;  but  the  original  root 
of  barbarism,  want  of  esteem  for  the  human  personality, 
he  also  makes  the  corner-stone  of  his  political  system.  The 
male  is  by  nature  better,  the  female  less  important.  Tlicre 
are  men  who  are  as  far  inferior  to  the  free  man  as  the  body 
is  to  the  soul,  or  the  animal  to  the  man.     These  are  the 

1  Compare  on  this  point  Schleiermacher  in  his  translation  of  the  Republic,  p.  35, 
and  what  Plato  narrates  in  his  Charraidas,  10,  155,  of  Socrates.  Touching  the 
latter,  also  Xenophon's  Memorabilia  i.  3,  14;  I.  6,  13. 


358  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

slaves.  The  slave  has  participancy  in  reason  only  to  the 
extent  that  he  can  be  sensible  of  it ;  but  he  does  not  possess 
it.  The  use  of  slaves  and  animals  is  but  slightly  different 
(Arist.  Politics,  vol.  i.,  chap.  2:  12-14).  The  slave  has 
not  the  least  reflective  ability  ;  even  in  the  moral  virtues  he 
has  only  share  enough  to  keep  him  from  neglecting  his 
work,  through  intractableness  or  indolence  (chap.  5,  6,  and 
9).  Still  more  barbarous  and  destructive  to  all  free  per- 
sonality are  the  state  laws  which  he  advances  regarding 
marriage  ;  to  which,  however,  I  cannot  here,  except  in  this 
general  way,  refer  (chap.  14:  1,  2,  10).  The  number  of 
children  that  may  be  born  is  determined  by  the  state; 
weakly  and  crippled  children  he,  like  Plato,  would  have 
put  to  death  (chap.  14  :  10). 

You  perceive,  from  even  these  few  traces,  that  with  the 
two  greatest  philosophers  of  antiquity  an  utter  confusion 
regarding  the  nature  of  culture  reigns.  Historically  ap- 
proved groundworks  of  it  are  pronounced  pernicious ;  es- 
pecially by  Plato,  roots  of  barbarism,  on  the  contrary,  are 
declared  to  be  means  of  salvation.  Withal,  it  must  be 
expressly  observed  that  what  has  been  communicated  is 
not  accidental,  incidental  remarks,  but  principles  and  aims 
of  their  philosophical  systems. 

Let  us  now,  having  acquainted  ourselves  with  some  of 
the  barriers  to,  and  defects  of,  the  culture  previous  to 
Christ,  at  least  in  their  general  outlines,  pass  to  the  con- 
sideration of  the  cultural  power  that  lies  in  Christianity,  and 
the  culture  which  has  actually  proceeded  from  Christianity. 

It  seems  to  me  to  be  wholly  incontroveHible,  that  a  view 
of  the  world  which  cannot  look  through  the  forces  which 
are  absolutely  inimical  to  culture,  is  still  less  able  to  over- 
come them,  and  therefore  can  never  call  into  existence  a 
complete  and  sound  culture.     Real  and  abiding  culture  will 


CHRISTIANITY    AND    CULTURE  359 

be  developed  only  when  its  original  enemy  has  been  recog- 
nized as  such,  and  with  inexorable  earnestness  combated 
till  entirely  subdued.  But  are  there,  then,  within  human- 
ity, forces  which  are  absolutely  inimical  to  the  complete, 
harmonious  culture  of  the  human  endowments? 

My  hearers,  let  there  pass  before  your  eyes  all  the  innu- 
merable and  utterable  horrors  which  not  only  in  one,  which 
among  all  nations,  which  not  only  in  one,  which  in  all  ages 
have  occurred ;  let  it  be  told  j^ou  by  the  incorruptible 
mouth  of  history  that  precisely  the  times  of  a  partial  bril- 
liant culture,  like  those  of  Pericles  and  Aristophanes,  of 
Caesar  Augustus  and  his  successors,  of  the  Medici,  and  of 
a  Louis  XIV.  and  a  Louis  XV.,  carry  in  their  bosom 
unculture  and  barbarism,  and  all  that  debases  man,  and 
tramples  his  honor  in  the  dirt ;  let  it  be  attested  by  the 
present  that  the  seats  of  a  partial  culture,  the  great  cities, 
are  to-day  yet  also  the  breeding-places  of  human  degen- 
eracy ;  still  more,  conceive  that,  like  the  omniscient  God, 
you  could,  with  one  look,  and  without  being  hindered  by 
disguise,  see  all  the  secret  and  open  offences,  the  host  of 
selfish  desires,  the  endless  progeny  of  hellish  thoughts  in 
mankind  and  in  human  hearts  and  heads, — would  you  then 
ask,  Are  there,  then,  within  humanity,  forces  which  are 
absolutely  inimical  to  the  complete,  harmonious  culture  of 
the  human  endowments  ?  And  if  now,  in  face  of  ^=ueh  tes- 
timonies of  universal  history  and  your  experience,  certain 
of  our  poets  and  philosophers  would  sing  and  prove  to  you 
that  sin  is  the  necessary  starting-point,  and  all  those  facts 
and  states  a  necessary,  reasonable  transition-point  in  the 
human  development ;  or,  if  you  hear  how  so-called  human- 
ism refers  those  black,  disgraceful  spots  in  humanity,  not 
to  a  positive  apostasy  from  God,  but  with  weakening  effect 
to  an  imperfection  still  adhering  to  human  nature,  in  spite 


360  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

of  which  man  will,  of  himself,  without  redemption,  attain 
to  full  development,  —  must  not  this  be  to  you  an  irrefraga- 
ble proof  that  the  human  reason  cannot,  by  its  own  light, 
apprehend  that  mysterious  but  actually-existing  power 
which  is  hostile  to  culture,  and  therefore  has  neither  the 
will  nor  the  ability  to  lay  the  axe  at  its  root  ?  Both  these 
are  found  in  Christianity  alone,  and,  indeed,  in  positive 
Biblical  Christianity.  Look  into  the  history  of  the  later 
philosophy  and  theology,  and  of  humanism  in  general. 
As  soon  as  you  see  the  spirit  of  the  times,  or  even  of  an 
individual,  be  he  the  sharpest  and  deepest  thinker,  or  the 
naturally  most  noble,  most  amiably-disposed  person,  devi- 
ating from  the  Scriptural  revelation  of  God  touching  the 
nature  of  sin,  he  becomes,  in  his  scientific  view,  immedi- 
ately more  yielding  and  lax  towards  sin,  the  mortal  enemy 
of  sound  culture,  concludes  a  philosophical  compromise 
with  it,  or  overlooks  it,  or  at  least  underrates  its  power, 
and  the  worm  remains  in  the  bud  or  flower,  and  eats  it 
Only  Biblical  Christianity  knows  no  compromise  with  sin, 
no  pardon  to  this  destroyer  of  mankind  and  its  develop- 
ment, only  deadly  earnest  combat  till  complete  victory  is 
gained.  Neither  does  Biblical  Christianity  allow  itself  to 
be  dazzled  by  a  brilliant  partial  culture,  but  looks  with 
calm,  clear  eye  at  the  death-germ  concealed  therein,  and 
says  decidedly  and  earnestly,  "Ye  must  be  born  again. 
That  which  is  born  of  the  flesh  is  flesh ;  and  all  flesh  is  as 
grass,  and  all  the  goodliness  thereof  as  the  flower  of  the 
field."  But  it  adds,  "Ye  can  be  born  again!"  and 
actually  and  truly  provides  the  means  whereby  man  and 
human  society  may  be  delivered  from  the  dominion  of  the 
power  inimical  to  culture,  and  thoroughly  renewed. 

This  is  not  to  be  understood   as    aflSrming    that    the 
bearers   of  Christianity   would   be,   at   once,   wholly   and 


CHRISTIANITY    AND   CULTURE  361 

forever  freed  from  that  corruptive  power;  rather  are  we 
taught  by  experience  that,  both  in  single  Christian  person- 
alities and  in  Christian  communities,  sin,  the  root  of 
barbarism,  has,  alas,  very  often  in  a  terrible  way  broken 
out  anew.  This,  however,  is  not  the  fault  of  Christianity, 
but  of  the  want  of  attention  to  it.  While  Humanism  on 
the  heights  of  her  development  makes  it  a  rule  —  as  one 
can  nowadaj^s  easily  see  —  to  boast  of  her  strength,  beauty, 
and  elevation,  and  cries  out  to  everybod}'.  So  high  I  have 
come  by  my  own  strength,  never  shall  I  be  made  low ! 
Christianity  makes  it  a  rule  to  admonish  her  adherents  to 
continued  humility,  to  earnest  search  for  knowledge  of  the 
sin  still  adherent  and  alwaj^s  asserting  its  existence  anew, 
to  incessant  repentance  and  self-abasement.  The  first  of 
Luther's  articles  —  those  ninety-five  from  which  the  renova- 
tion of  Christianity  has  proceeded  —  runs,  "  Whereas  our 
Master  and  Lord  Jesus  Christ  says.  Repent,  etc.,  he  would 
that  the  whole  life  on  earth  of  his  believing  ones  should  be 
a  constant  or  incessant  repentance."  As  soon  as  the 
Christian  community  should  forget  this,  and  mind  not  the 
corruptive  power  still  inherent  in  itself,  it  would  be  ruined 
by  this,  as  were  the  states  of  antiquity.  The  Romish 
Church  is  the  proof.  Before  the  Reformation  it  was  still 
penetrated  by  a  consciousness  of  an  internal  corruption  ; 
the  cry  for  a  reformation  in  head  and  members  was  as  yet 
not  to  be  suppressed.  But  since  the  Tridentine  Council 
every  recognition  of  internal  sin  and  impurity  has  dis- 
appeared ;  no  expression  of  repentance  on  the  part  of  the 
church  as  such,  only  boasting  of  infallibility,  of  perfection. 
But  since  then  the  states  in  which  the  Papal  Church  has 
been  able  to  unfold  its  power  without  restriction  have 
been  very  nearly  ruined. 

There  are  many  sad  defects  in  our  Evangelical  Church. 


362  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

There  is  much  that  is  rotten  in  the  predominantly  Evan- 
gelical States.  But  as  long  as  our  church  remains  con- 
scious of  its  internal  evils,  and  truly  and  honestly  confesses 
and  contends  against  them ;  as  long  as  the  Protestant 
peoples  truly  observe  their  national  fast-days  ;  as  long,  in  a 
word,  as  we  have  the  real  sources  of  corruption  disclosed 
for  us  by  Christianity,  —  so  long  will  our  history  furnish 
the  proof  that  Christianity  is  the  salt  of  the  earth. 

Or  does  human  history  show  us  another  power  which 
can  preserve  from  putrefaction,  and  thoroughly  cleanse, 
sanctify,  form  anew?  Perhaps  reason  and  science? 
"Possibly,"  says  Hamann,  "philosophy  could  do  us  no 
other  service  than  to  set  our  passion  in  a  methodical, 
forced,  and  affected  play"  (vol.  ii.  p.  195).  And  the  same 
Mephistopheles,  who  terms  reason  and  science  the  highest 
potency  of  man,  flings,  nevertheless,  into  the  face  of  the 
god  of  humanism,  in  cold  blood,  the  afllrmation  that  man 
uses  the  appearance  of  the  heavenly  light,  reason,  only 

"  To  be  more  beastly  than  any  beast. 
Saving  thy  Gracious  Presence,  he  to  me 
A  long-legged  grasshopper  appears  to  be, 
That  springing  flies,  and  flying  springs, 
And  in  the  grass  the  same  old  ditty  sings. 
Would  he  still  lie  among  the  grass  he  grows  in  I 
Each  bit  of  dung  he  seeks,  to  stick  his  nose  in."  ^ 

In  each  bit  of  dung !  And  can  the  impartial  history  of 
mankind,  and  especially  the  history  of  philosophy  and 
science,  say  to  Mephistopheles,  —  Thou  liest !  Must  it  not 
rather  change  the  ironic  "possibly"  of  Ilamann  into  an 
indisputable  surely.  Nothing  else,  indeed,  can  be  done. 
Philosophy  does  not  make  man,  but  man  makes  his  philos 

1  Bayard  Taylor's  Translation,  p.  16. 


CHRISTIANITY    AND   CULTURE  363 

ophy.  Man  is  not  a  product  of  his  reason,  but  reason  is 
one  of  the  faculties  of  man.  As  is  the  man,  so  is  also  his 
reason,  his  phiIosoph3\  The  reason  is  an  expression,  a 
revelation,  of  the  human  existence.  If  this,  the  fountain, 
is  pure,  then  is  also  the  emanation  pure  ;  if  the  fountain  is 
turbid,  then  also  the  emanation.  The  emanation  cannot 
cleanse  the  fountain.  Man  purifies  the  reason  ;  not  the 
reason  man.  Man  preserves  the  reason  from  sin  and  error  ; 
not  the  reason  man.  First,  then,  must  man's  essential 
being  be  redeemed  from  the  power  inimical  to  culture,  and 
then  a  redemption  also  of  the  reason  can  be  expected.  Or 
is  a  sickly  root  to  be  cured  by  attempting  to  cultivate  on 
the  tree  a  bough  ?  Only  Chi'istianity  seeks  to  sanctify  the 
kernel  of  the  human  personality  from  within,  and  thence  to 
carry  purification  through  the  individual  faculties  of  the 
human  life,  such  as  understanding,  reason,  imagination, 
talent  for  art,  etc. ;  while  the  non-Christian  wisdom  en- 
deavors, by  beginning  with  the  individual  faculties, —  reason, 
talent  for  art,  and  the  like,  —  to  improve  the  central 
natures  of  men. 

In  the  same  measure,  then,  in  which  it  is  true  that  only 
Christianity  takes  cognizance  of  and  overcomes  the  enemies 
of  culture,  in  that  measure  is  it  true  that  Christianity  is  the 
groundwork  of  culture ;  and  in  the  measure  in  which  it  is 
true  that  all  other  views  of  life  do  not  take  cognizance  of 
the  enemies  of  culture  and  their  real  nature,  still  less  over- 
come them,  in  that  measure  is  it  true  that  they  cannot  be 
regarded  as  suitable  for  the  groundwork  of  a  sound  and 
enduring  culture.  With  these  general  considerations,  let 
us  turn  yet  to  the  principal  phenomena  of  the  cultural  life. 
As  such  I  designate  the  free,  spiritual  personality,  marriage 
and  the  family-relation,  the  state,  and  again,  within  these 
domains  of  life,  science  and  art. 


364  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

We  begin  with  the  conception  of  personality.  The 
ancient  philosophy,  in  order  to  hold  fast  the  unity  of  deity, 
surrendered  the  living  personality  of  the  same,  and  did  not 
find  it  again,  even  through  Plato,  still  less  through  Aris- 
totle. From  that  time  down  to  the  present,  the  philosophy 
which  has  not  been  rooted  in  the  Christian  revelation  has 
been  so  little  able  to  attain  to  an  understanding  of  the 
Absolute  Personality,  that  it  has  declared  the  same  to  be 
an  absurdity,  a  self-contradiction,  or  else  has  degraded  the 
Absolute  Personality  to  the  pitiable  figure  of  the  impotent, 
dead,  mummy-like  Deistic  and  Eationalistic  God.  Nay, 
even  the  theology  which  has  not  been  firmly  rooted  in  the 
Biblical  revelation  has  abandoned  the  personality  of  God. 
Remember,  for  instance,  Schleiermacher.  If  there  is  no 
absolute  personality,  there  is  also  no  relative  personality. 
In  pantheism,  man  is  an  emerging,  and  again  disappear- 
ing wave  of  the  great  life-substance ;  the  system  knows 
only  necessity,  not  freedom,  not  personality.  According 
to  materialism,  man  is  a  product  of  matter ;  his  thoughts 
and  feelings  are  the  secretions  of  bodily  functions.  How 
can  free,  spiritual  personality  be  here  spoken  of?  To  flat 
rationalism,  man  is  —  pardon  the  expression  —  an  under- 
standing-chest ;  to  the  higher  rationalism,  a  thinking  exist- 
ence, whose  reason  is  able  to  fathom  and  criticise  all  things. 
The  wonderful  mystery  of  a  full,  living  personality  is 
reduced  to  a  logical  phantom.  Even  the  theology  which 
is  wiser  than  divine  revelation  in  the  end  lets  the  human 
personality  go,  as  is  evident  enough  from  its  doctrine 
respecting  the  life  eternal.  Only  Christianity  brings  us  to 
even  a  far-off  understanding  of  the  Absolute  Personality ; 
only  Christianity,  therefore,  is  in  earnest  about  the  relative 
personality  of  man.  "  Let  us  make  man  in  our  image, 
after  our  likeness.     So  God  created  man  in  his  own  image, 


CHRISTIANITY    AND   CULTURE  365 

in  the  image  of  God  created  he  him."  Man,  then,  accord- 
Ing  to  the  Christian  view,  is  a  free,  spiritual  personality ; 
for  he  is  the  image  of  the  Absolute  Personality.  And 
now  consider  what  an  important  relation  the  personality 
sustains  to  culture  ;  that  it  is  so  much  the  bearer  of  culture, 
that  without  it  culture  seems  inconceivable.  Remember, 
further,  that  all  great  historical  epochs  of  culture  have  had 
their  starting-point  in  the  relatively  creative  power  of  per- 
sonality, their  promotion  in  the  force  of  personalities, 
their  culmination  in  the  glory  of  a  personality ;  or  that 
even  in  the  aberration  of  a  personality  the  most  energetic 
powers  have  concentrated  themselves  to  one-sidedness,  to 
distortion,  to  ruin.  And  as  the  sure  result  of  your  reflec- 
tion the  conviction  will  force  itself  on  you,  that  a  view  of 
life  which  obliterates  the  essential  conception  of  person- 
ality is,  in  its  inmost  nature,  inimical  to  culture ;  that,  on 
the  contrary,  Christianity,  whose  inmost  impulse  is  the 
knowledge  and  care  of  personality,  must  be  called  Guardian 
and  Friend  of  culture.  This  would  still  more  plainly 
appear,  could  we  enter  into  the  spirituo-moral  sanctification 
and  unfolding  of  the  human  personality.  "We  admire  the 
masters  of  art,  who,  as  with  poetic  license  we  express  our- 
selves, breathe  life  into  blocks  of  marble ;  but  what  are  all 
these  masters  compared  with  the  personal  Originator  of 
Christianity,  who  breathes  his  life  into  lost  human  nature, 
and  makes  of  it  actually  and  truly  living  images  of  God  I 
But  this  consideration  would  lead  us  from  the  realm  of 
culture  into  that  which  is  specifically  religious ;  hence  we 
relinquish  it,  and  only  refer  to  the  familiar  words  of  the 
man  who  makes  the  development  of  the  human  race  to  com- 
mence with  sin :  — 

"  lleligion  of  the  cross,  only  thou  bindest  together  in  one 
Crown  of  humility  and  strength  two  gifts  of  the  palm." 


366  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

Certainl}'',  the  religion  which  in  such  a  way  exerts  a 
cultural  influence  on  the  human  personality,  and  indeed 
according  to  the  admission  of  one  who  was  not  its  friend, 
has  a  sound  and  fruitful  culture-producing  power. 

The  essential  thing  in  the  human  personality  is  the  image 
of  God,  and  indeed  not  merely  in  the  free  man  of  a  select 
race,  but  in  all  men,  also  in  the  slave  and  in  the  woman. 
Moreover,  the  God  who,  with  the  creation  of  man,  breathed 
into  him  his  living,  spiritual  breath,  also  implanted  in  apos- 
tate humanity  his  only-begotten  Son,  the  express  image  of 
his  person,  that  by  him  every  man  might  be  freed  from  sin 
and  renewed  from  glory  to  glory.  Every  man  who  is  led  back 
by  Christ  into  life-fellowship  with  God  is  a  child  and  heir  of 
God  ;  stands  before  God  as  a  king.  Christ,  the  first-born  Son 
of  God,  so  loved,  so  highly  esteemed  every  man  that  he 
laid  down  his  life  for  him,  and  is  not  ashamed  to  call  him 
his  brother,  and  says  to  all  the  children  of  men,  "  Whatso^ 
ever  ye  have  done  unto  one  of  the  least  of  these  my  brethren 
ye  have  done  unto  me ;  and  whatsoever  ye  did  not  unto  one 
of  the  least  of  these  ye  did  not  to  me."  So  Christianity 
looks  on  man,  and  by  this  view  alone  is  the  unculture  and 
barbarism  connected  with  the  establishing  by  classic  an- 
tiquity of  a  degrading  difference  between  people,  between 
man  and  man,  between  man  and  woman,  overcome.  As  an 
irrefutable  maxim  in  the  consideration  of  the  human  per- 
sonality within  Christianity  the  saying  of  Paul  now  holds 
good,  "  Here  there  is  neither  Jew  nor  Greek,  neither  bond 
nor  free,  neither  male  nor  female ;  for  ye  are  all  one  in 
Christ  Jesus  (Gal.  3  :  28).  And  ye  have  put  on  the  new 
man  which  is  renewed  in  the  image  of  him  that  created 
him  ;  where  there  is  neither  Greek  nor  Jew,  circumcision  nor 
uncircumcision,  barbarian,  Scythian,  bond  nor  free;  but 
Christ  is  all,  and  in  all"  (Col.  3:  10,  11).     Here  we  have 


CHRISTIANITY    AND   CULTURE  367 

the  noble,  vigorous  root  from  which  alone  true  culture  in 
the  consideration  and  treatment  of  the  human  personality 
has  grown,  and  can  grow.  A  man  who  will  not  be  con- 
tinually influenced  by  the  spirit  of  Christianity  cannot 
possibly  apprehend  in  the  perishing  and  lost  the  dignity  of 
the  human  personality.  He  will,  first  in  the  treatment,  and 
then  also  in  the  consideration  of  the  human  personality, 
approximate  to  the  ancient  barbarism.  A  partial  culture 
does  so  little  against  this,  that  it  looks  upon  him  who  lacks 
this  partial  culture  as  inferior,  erects  barriers,  and  lapses 
into  a  squeamish  caste-existence.  For  knowledge  puffs  up, 
only  love  edifies. 

Only  by  woman's  being  put  on  a  complete  equality  with 
man,  in  the  points  which  concern  the  essential  being  of  the 
human  personality,  is  it  possible  for  man  duly  to  esteem 
woman,  and  in  the  full  sense  of  the  word  love  her,  i.  e., 
give  himself  to  her,  and  for  the  woman  to  become  really 
the  helpmate  of  man.  Only  on  this  condition  also  is  a  true 
marriage  and  a  true  family-relation  possible.  Only  by 
Christianity,  therefore,  is  woman  placed  in  the  position 
that  rightfully  belongs  to  her,  a  position  where  she  can 
develop  the  whole  power  of  her  womanhood.  Only  by 
Christianity  has  the  man  as  well  as  the  woman  received  the 
incalculable  blessing  of  a  true  matrimonial  family-life.  The 
philosophers  of  the  later  antiquity  beheld  with  amaze- 
ment the  wonderful  transformation  which  Christianity  had 
efi*ected  in  woman,  marriage,  families. 

Libanius,  a  mortal  enemy  of  Christianity,  the  tutor  of 
Caesar  Julian  the  apostate,  who  pronounced  his  pupil  John 
Chrysostom  the  most  excellent  of  all,  when  he  had  heard 
the  boy's  story  about  his  mother  Anthnsa,  broke  forth  in 
the  words,  "  What  women  these  Christians  have  !  " 

Marriage  and  the  family  are  the  bases  of  culture.     He 


368  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

who  undermines  them  is  a  traitor  to  mankind  and  its 
healthful  development.  Something  of  this  even  a  Horace 
saw.     He  confesses  (Odes,  Bk.  iii.  6)  ;  — 

** Fertile  in  sins,  the  times  of  late 
Have  rendered,  first,  the  marriage-state, 

Then  race  and  home,  unsound. 
Prom  this  polluted  fountain-head 
The  direst  influence  has  spread 

O'er  land  and  people  round. 

**  What  has  unspoiled  by  time  remained? 
The  age  which  to  our  sires  pertained, 

More  vicious  a  degree 
Than  our  grandsires,  has  given  birth 
More  vile  to  us,  who'll  curse  the  earth 

With  offspring  worse  than  we." 

No  civilization  which  is  not  grounded  firmly  in  God's 
word  can  keep  marriage  and  the  family-relation  pure  and 
steadfast.  In  the  times  of  the  most  brilliant  partial 
culture,  just  these  fundamental  conditions  of  genuine 
culture  sufier  most ;  as  you  have  just  heard  from  the  mouth 
of  Horace,  and  as  the  history  of  a  Louis  XIV.  and  his 
times  tells  you.  The  aberration  of  men's  heads  and  hearts 
goes  so  far  that  the  chief  supports  no  longer  are  recog- 
nized as  the  chief  supports.  That  is  barbarism  in  princi- 
ple. And  this  barbarism  reigns  in  our  day,  in  our  midst. 
The  past  century  is  considered  to  be  the  blooming-period 
of  our  poetry.  And  precisely  this  century  has  given  us  a 
marriage-legislation  by  which  marriage  is  in  reality 
abolished.  "  Because  the  matrimonial  relation,"  says 
Hamann,  "  is  the  precious  foundation  and  corner-stone  of 
all  society,  the  misanthropical  spirit  of  our  century  reveals 
itself   most   largely   in   the   marriage    laws."^     One   who 

}  Verauch  einerSibylle  iiber  dieEhe,  vol.  rv.  p.  227. 


CHRISTIANITY    AND    CULTURE  869 

•efuses  to  be  judged  wholly  by  divine  revelation  laughs 
low  or  loud,  and  proceeds  to  prove,  l)y  his  reason  or  his 
sesthetical  taste,  that  the  ground-pillars  of  culture  are  not 
the  ground-pillars  of  culture,  that  at  all  events  they  can 
be  eaten  into  by  subjective  lusts,  —  as  can  be  plainly  seen 
by  way  of  example  even  in  Sehleierraacher's  letters  about 
Frederick  Schlegel's  sad  "  Luzinde,"  in  aesthetical  garb  in 
Goethe*s  "Affinities"  and  "Stella,"  and  in  later  times, 
open  and  blunt,  in  the  pleasure-and-authority  doctrine,  as 
well  as  in  public  demands  of  the  well-known  Her  von 
Kirchmann,^  formerly  president  of  the  Court  of  Appeals. 

He  whose  eyes  this  does  not  open  must  read  the  thou- 
sand wretched  romances  which  for  a  century  have  been 
devoured  by  our  people,  and  whose  chief  service  has  been 
to  undermine  the  Christian  view  of  marriage  and  of  the 
family-relation  ;  or  he  must  look  behind  the  screens  of  the 
more  than  heathenish  so-called  free  love  in  America ;  ^  and, 
if  all  this  does  not  suffice,  then  he  must  cast  a  glance 
into  the  fearful  orgies  of  our  large  and  small  cities,  and 
into  the  sentiments  of  millions  of  our  cultivated  and  uncul- 
tivated cotemporaries  on  matrimony  and  the  relation  of 
the  sexes,  — to  see  with  horror  what  it  is  a  sliame  to  speak 
of.  Did  Christianity  not  stand  here,  as  a  preacher  in  the 
wilderness,  and  scatter  a  little  small  salt,  the  decaying 
foundations  would  long  since  have  ftiUen  in,  and  the  abyss 
of  barbarism  have  swallowed  us  up.  But  Christianity  is  in 
this  region  also  a  salt  which  can  save  our  culture  from 
universal  and  absolute  rottenness.  Still  truly  Christian 
marriages  and  families  stand  before  the  eyes  of  poor  ship- 

1  ^sthetik  auf  reaUstiecher  Grundlage  (Berlin,  1868),  vol.  I.,  p.  99  ff.  108  ff.  The 
same  Kirchmaun,  moreover,  condemns  in  the  sharpest  terms  the  '•  Luzinde  "  which 
Schleiermacher  deifies  as  the  ideal  of  woman's  love  for  man,  vol.  I.,  p.  313.  So 
fall  even  great  theologians  when  God's  word  is  no  longe?  a  If-mp  to  their  feet. 

2  Comp.  Yolksblatt  fiir  Stadt  und  Land,  1869,  no.  4. 

Y 


370  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

wrecked  people  as  saving  ideals.     Think  of  Kinkel.     With 
Christianity  he  has  absolutely  broken.     "Let,"  he  cries, — 

"  Let  old  women  vex  themselves, 
Will  they  then,  'bout  heaven ; 
Free  men,  though,  we  are,  and  will 
Not  to  that  be  given." 

But  this  same  Kinkel  sees  a  quiet  parsonage,  in  which 
Christ  is  guest  and  has  sanctified  marriage  and  the  house- 
hold-relation, and  sighs :  — 

"  Blessed  peace !  all  world-embittered, 
Wounded,  flees  my  heart  to  thee, 
Trembles  with  foreboding  of  that 
Rest  in  the  Eternity." 

"  Yes,  my  heart,  with  ease  thou  couldest 
Thus  the  world's  aflairs  resign ; 
And  thou  wouldest  beat  more  calmly, 
Were  such  outward  quiet  thine ! " 

We  enter  upon  the  domain  of  the  political  life.  To  him 
who  admits  that  esteem  for  the  human  personality,  that 
marriage  and  the  family-relation  are  the  groundworks  of 
human  society, —  to  him  it  is  clear  beyond  a  doubt  that  only 
Christianity  can  produce,  sustain,  consummate  genuine  politi- 
cal organizations.  To  him  who  does  not  admit  the  maxim 
named  it  is  as  impossible  in  this  field  to  say  another  word, 
as  in  the  field  of  mathematics  to  one  who  refuses  to  accept 
the  multiplication-table. 

But  let  us  notice  other  fundamental  relations  which  con- 
dition the  life  of  the  state  ;  and,  first  of  all,  the  divisions, 
necessary  to  organic  life,  into  rich  and  poor,  high  and  low, 
etc.  What  is  naturally  good  and  necessary  the  power 
hostile  to  culture  has  transformed  into  fatal  contradictions. 


CHRISTIANITY    AND    CULTURE  371 

As  ID  the  atmosphere  the  inequalities  of  temperature  strive 
by  storms  to  equalize  themselves,  so  in  the  popular  life  it 
has,  down  to  the  present,  stormed,  and  will  continue  to 
storm,   in   order  to   equalize   the  rough,  unendurable   in- 
equalities.    In  the  non-Christian  cultural  life  there  is  no 
means   by  which   the   same   may  be   effected.     This  even 
thoughtful  heathen  perceived.     Aristotle  remarks  that  most 
counsel  for  the  quieting  of  the  people  aimed  at  a  correct 
disposition  of  the  relations  of  ability  ;  for  thence  generally 
arose  tumults.     "  But,"  says  he  then,  "  much  rather  is  it 
needful  to  equalize  the  desires  than  the  possessions.     For 
men  commit  wrong  not  merely  on    account  of  necessary 
wants,  such  as  hunger  and  thirst,  but  also  for  tlieir  grati- 
fication, to  still  their  desires  ;  nay,  the  greatest  sins  occur 
on  account  of  excessive  lusts,  not  on  account  of  necessary 
wants.     The  baseness  of  men  is  an  insatiable  thing ;   it 
asks  more  and  more  to  infinity  ;  for  boundless  is  the  nature 
of  desire,  for  whose  satisfaction  the  great  mass  of  people 
live."     (Politics,  vol.  n.,  chap.  4,  §  4,  5-11.)     So  far  phi- 
losophy.    Only  Christianity  is  rich  and  strong  enough  to 
equalize   the   pernicious    inequalities.     The   essential   dif- 
ference between  man  and  man,  between  people  and  people, 
it  has  in   principle  overcome.     Every  man,  every  people, 
recognized  in  his  or  its  worthiness,  receives  through  Chris- 
tianity a  possession  and  enjoyment,  an  end  to  aim  at  by 
which  the  whole  man  can  be  satisfied,  and  sees  thereby  the 
fundamental   condition   of   development    met.     In    truth, 
Christianity  is  so  far  from  wishing  to  abolish  all  earthly 
differences  and  make  all  things  even  that  it  supports  as  a 
divine  regulation  the  division  of  society  into  classes,  such 
as  rulers  and  subjects,  rich  and  poor,  gentle  and  common. 
But  while  it  always  accents  the  idea  that  this  difference  is 
only  temporal  and  accidental,  not  an  essential  one,  rather 


372  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

that  the  real  kernel  of  the  human  personality  is  of  like 
worth  and  summoned  to  a  like  end  ;  it  incites  the  one  to 
labor  and  earnest  combat  to  obtain  for  himself  in  a  justifi- 
able way  the  external  earthly  position  which  renders 
possible  and  facilitates  the  internal  progress,  and  teaches 
the  other  not  miserly  to  keep  to  himself  the  advantages 
lent  him,  but  to  recognize  the  former  in  his  struggle.  "  Let 
the  brother  of  low  degree  rejoice  in  that  he  is  exalted ; 
but  the  rich  in  that  he  is  made  low."  This  is  the  only 
possible  equalization ;  every  other  attempt  at  it  will 
fail. 

Another  fundamental  relation  in  the  state's  life  is  that 
of  justice  and  duty.  In  the  humane  state,  theoretically 
only  justice  reigns  so  much  that  it  is  called  the  justice- 
state.*  It  is  utterly  impossible  for  justice  alone  to  bind 
the  state  together  in  a  unitary  organism.  Justice  divides 
to  every  man  his  own,  and  punishes  him  who  reaches  be- 
yond his  own.  Granting  now  that  justice  could  succeed  in 
accomplishing  the  impossible  and  thus  did  divide  to  every 
man  his  own,  and  restrain  every  man  from  grasping  that 
of  others,  still  every  individual  would  be,  only  a  little 
isolated  whole  by  himself,  an  atom.  Who  shall  bring  the 
atoms  together  into  one  great  living  whole?  It  is  said, 
Duty,  which  even  the  justice-state  requires.  Were  men 
numbers  or  logical  conceptions,  then  it  would  be  possible 
to  execute  such  an  equilibristic  feat,  in  which  duty  and 
justice  keep  up  between  them  the  balance.  But,  now,  men 
have  strong  desires ;  especially  are  they  full  of  the  selfish 
desire  to  claim  very  much  as  justice,  and  to  regard  very 
little  as  duty,  for  themselves.  Who  shall  restore  the 
equilibrium?  Only  the  conqueror  of  the  selfish  desires. 
Love,  can  do  that.     And,  indeed,  not  the   hollow  phrase 

1  Der  RechtoBtaat. 


CHRISTIANITY    AND    CULTURE  373 

of  love  ;  but  the  essential  love  which  is  grounded  in  Chris- 
tianity, or,  better,  in  Christ.  When  this  love,  born  of 
God,  the  giving  of  self  to  the  whole  and  to  individuals,  a 
principle  that  cannot  be  extorted  by  any  Jus,  forms  no 
longer  a  power  in  the  popular  life,  then  will  also  the  modern 
state,  as  did  the  ancient,  fall  into  atomic  fragments,  and 
bleed  to  death  on  the  internal  contradiction  between  re- 
quired justice  and  duty  not  performed .^ 

Permit  me  to  refer  yet  to  a  fundamental  condition  in  the 
popular  life,  to  the  relation  between  labor  and  rest.  In 
the  stir  and  whirl  of  the  present,  when  restlessl}'  and 
gigantically  progressing  industr}^  in  union  with  as  violent 
a  passion  for  enjoyment,  is  urging  on  humanity,  alread}' 
urged  half-to-death,  more  and  more,  Christianity  calmly 
stands,  and  wearies  not  in  attesting  that  only  the  right 
observance  of  the  Sabbath  can  save  individuals  and 
peoples  from  being  ruined  by  work  and  pleasure.  In 
North  America  first,  and  secondly  in  England,  this  restless 
activity  is  at  the  highest.  Were  it  not  that  in  these 
countries  Sunday  is  still  celebrated,  perhaps  as  a  state- 
custom,  who  knows  but  that  they  would  have  already 
exhausted  their  energies  ?  That  with  us  mails  and  roads, 
in  many  places  manufactories  also,  and  on  numerous  large 
estates  agriculture,  find  no  rest  even  on  the  Sabbath, 
contributes  not  to  the  promotion  of  culture.  To  assail  the 
Sabbath  is  to  assail  a  jewel  of  culture,  a  foundation-pillar 
of  the  popular  welfare. 

A   deadly  enemy  of  Christianity,   the   so-called   Social 

1  Two  of  Shakespeare's  principal  plays,  '*  The  Merchant  of  Venice"  and  ''Meas- 
ure for  Measure,"  show  that  state  laws  fail  to  preserve  the  state,  private  justice  to 
protect  the  private  life  of  the  citizens,  and  penal  justice  to  compel  in  the  right  way 
the  puhUc  life;  that,  if  the  Ufe  of  the  state  is  to  prosper,  other  forces,  grace  and 
love,  and  indeed  such  grace  and  love  as  come  from  God's  grace  and  love,  mnaX 
rule  in  it. 


374  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

Democratic  party,  has  perceived  this  at  least,  and  is  clamor- 
ing loudly  for  freedom  from  labor  on  Sunday.  But  trans- 
plant the  noblest  date-palm  into  northern  soil,  and  it 
remains  there  not  the  date-palm.  Sunday  is  blessing- 
bringing  Sunday  only  in  the  maternal  soil  of  Christianity. 
In  the  Social  Democratic  camp  it  will  become  the  day  it  is 
already  everywhere  in  apostate  Christendom,  —  the  day  on 
which  the  most  sins  occur,  and  culture  is  the  most  deeply 
sapped. 

And  now  ask  the  present  world  around  you.  Who  are  they 
that  still  place  themselves  in  the  midst  of  the  waves  pro- 
tectingly  about  tliis  popular  and  cultural  palladium,  the 
Sabbath,  the  true  equalizer  of  labor  and  rest ;  the  disciples 
of  positive,  Biblical  Christianity,  or  the  men  who  make  of 
Christianity  half  an  echo  and  half  a  marionette  of  the 
times-spirit  ? 

I  have  thus  far  spoken  on  the  principles  of  Christianity 
and  of  the  state ;  I  must  now  invite  you  to  question  uni- 
versal history.  Which  are  the  states,  still  existing,  whose 
mother  is  not  Christianity?  There  are  in  reality  only  two. 
The  Chinese  empire  and  the  Turkish  !  For  neither  culture 
does  any  adversary  of  Christianity  have  an  itching. 

All  the  other  states  of  our  day  were  founded  and  have 
been,  and  are  still,  sustained  by  Christianity.  Dating  our 
present  state-formations  no  farther  back  than  the  times  of 
Charlemagne  and  Alfred  the  -Great,  Ave  have  lasted 
alread}^  a  thousand  years.  Greece  and  Rome  were  after  a 
thousand  years  no  more.  Their  citizens  were  just  as  wise, 
just  as  rational,  just  as  energetic,  just  as  patriotic,  just  as 
aesthetic,  just  as  juristic,  just  as  diplomatic,  just  as  rhe- 
torical as  we  are.  That  no  one  will  dispute.  The  enemies, 
too,  of  our  peoples  and  states  are  equally  as  powerful  and 
numerous  as  were  theirs.  But  still  we  are  not  yet  in  the 
grave  ;  on  the  contrary,  the  assurance  is  given  us  that  the 


CHRISTIANITY    AND    CULTURE  375 

nineteenth  century  is  the  blooming-period  of  mankind. 
Has  a  mightier  industr}^,  has  the  enormous  progress  of  the 
natural  sciences,  prolonged  our  life  beyond  that  of  those 
noble,  ancient  peoples?  That  one  would  hardly  like  to 
affirm.  Well,  then  I  know  of  nothing  else  that  they  had 
not,  and  that  we  have,  save  Christianit}',  whose  principles 
are  the  sources  and  fortresses  of  sound  political  principles. 
And  still  Christianit}^  continues  to  demonstrate  its 
people-improving  and  state-forming  potency.  The  heathen 
mission  is  a  child  of  positive  Christianity.  This  has  an 
internal  and  necessary  prompting  to  restore  the  dignity  of 
the  human  personality  in  all  men,  thereby  to  establish  an 
existence  worthy  of  man,  marriage,  and  the  state.  They 
who  accept  Christianity  only  after  having  deprived  it  of 
its  soul,  feel  not  this  prompting.  They  resign  to  selfish 
culture  the  cultivation  of  the  savage  peoples.  We  see,  to 
be  sure,  that  traders  carry  powder  and  brandy  and  moral 
pest  into  the  lands  of  the  heathen,  and  increase  the  original 
barbarism,  if  only  thereby  they  become  richer  and  gratif}' 
their  desires.  Is  that  culture?  Whence,  then,  shall  those 
peoples  receive  culture,  if  not  from  Christianity?  "  Could, 
indeed,"  an  eminently  scientific  man  asks  the  humane 
culture,  "  could,  indeed,  our  literati  and  academicians  so 
much  as  land  on  the  coasts  of  savage,  hostile  peoples, 
except  they  brought  with  them  the  resignation  with  which 
an  apostle  comes  who  is  ready  to  become  a  martyr?  Or 
should,"  he  adds  in  the  most  profound  irony,  "  or  should 
this  mission  of  civilization  wait  a  while,  until  the  islands 
had  received  European  governments,  and  one  could  unpack 
and  set  up  the  beautiful  instruments  under  the  protection 
of  cannon  ?  "  ^ 

iNitzsch:  What  Evangelical  Christianity  has  done  among  Cultureless  Peoples, 
according  to  Facts  from  the  Missionary  History  of  the  last  Half-century.  (A 
Lecture.)    Berlin,  Wilhelm  Schultze.    1852. 


376  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

He  then  notices  what  Christianity  has  in  our  times  made, 
e.  g.,  of  the  South  Sea  Islands,  of  New  Zealand,  of  the 
Karens ;  confesses,  "  Without  a  miracle  such  an  establish- 
ing of  culture  is  impossible  !  "  and  refers  to  the  expression 
of  Karl  Hitter,  who  calls  the  transformation,  effected  by 
evangelical  Christianity,  of  the  New  Zealand  cannibals  into 
peaceful  men,  "a  true  miracle  of  our  day."  He,  an 
ornament  to  science,  openly  declares,  what  to  be  sure  we 
all  know,  that  not  science,  not  the  doctrines  of  universal 
religion,  but  the  peculiar  facts  of  Christianity  worked  this 
cultural  miracle. 

Where  Biblical  Christianity  is  lastingl}^  injured,  there 
the  states  also  suffer  severe  injuries.  Since  the  Tridentine 
Council,  Romish  Christianity  has  set  itself  in  intentional 
and  persistent  opposition  to  essential  points  of  Biblical 
Christianity.  Who  but  a  blind  man  can  to-day  deny  that 
the  purely  Catholic  States  are  also  those  which  present  the 
saddest  aspect ! 

"  In  Italy,"  —  so,  in  the  midst  of  the  triumplial  procession 
of  King  Victor  Immanuel,  an  eminent  statesman,  who  con- 
cerned himself  personally  very  little  about  religious  matters, 
said  to  me,  —  "  in  Italy  not  the  financial  trouble  is  the  one 
full  of  despair,  but  the  wide-spread  undermining  of  the 
state's  religious  and  moral  foundations."  Is  there  any 
need  of  saying  much  as  to  Spain  ?  And  has  it  proved  the 
salvation  of  France  that  under  Louis  XIV.,  brilliant  infi- 
delity, moral  frivolity,  egotistic  absolutism,  on  the  one 
side,  and  the  stiffest  Romanism  on  the  other,  combined  by 
the  destruction  of  Jansenism  to  put  down  the  last  power- 
ful reaction  of  Biblical  Christianity  inside  the  Catholic 
Church? 

And  look  at  our  German  fatherland.  When  did  its 
national  honor  lie  deepest  in  disgrace?     From  what  cause 


CHRISTIANITY    AND    CULTURE  377 

came  the  day  of  Jena,  and  what  followed  it,  upon  us? 
And  b}^  what  means  have  we  risen  from  the  disgrace? 
The  displacement  of  Christianity  from  the  popular  life  by 
French  immorality  and  stupid  rationalism,  —  that  it  was 
that  overthrew  our  national  life.  The  new  Christian 
breath  of  life  has  saved  us. 

I  leave  this  domain,  to  conduct  you  to  that  of  science 
and  art.  Our  noblest  and  most  peculiar  treasure  is  lan- 
guage. The  centre-point  of  science  is,  therefore,  the 
science  of  language.  Chilstianity  has  brilliantly  proved 
its  language-forming  power.  Let  us  stop,  first,  with  our 
mother  tongue.  The  present  form  thereof  has  its  vigorous 
life-root  in  the  Lutheran  translation  of  the  Bible.  A 
departure  from  the  spirit  breathing  in  this  for  a  long 
while  corrupted  our  language.  A  new  and  better  epoch 
begins  with  Klopstock's  Messias.  By  Klopstock,  and  still 
more  by  the  Lutheran  Bible,  Goethe  and  Schiller  had  their 
language  formed. 

Compare  with  the  German  language  which  has  proceedf>d 
from  our  Bible  the  language  which  our  philosophers  speak, 
e.  g.,  a  Hegel.  We  can  and  we  will  rejoice  in  our  German 
language  more  than  many  peoples  can  in  theirs,  but 
certainly  not  in  the  Hegelian  or  the  abstract  philosophical 
in  general,  w^hich  long  since  —  and  it  deserved  it  —  became 
a  derision. 

That  Dante,  and  especially  his  Divine  Comedy,  born  as 
it  was  of  Christianity,  has  in  like  manner  become  the 
father  of  the  Italian  language,  as  Luther  of  ours,  I  will  at 
least  in  a  word  mention,  to  remind  you  then  of  a  fact 
which  in  the  whole  history  of  culture  stands  alone.  The 
Bible  is  now  translated  into  one  hundred  and  eighty-two 
languages  and  dialects.  In  not  yet  one  hundred  years 
about  one  hundred  languages  have  been  raised  by  Biblical 


378    .  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

Christianity  to  Scripture-language;  and  with  this  Bible- 
language  the  foundation  for  wider  culture  in  all  depart- 
ments of  science  and  art  is  laid.  That  is  a  phenomenon  in 
the  realm  of  the  spirit  which  all  the  gigantic  advances  and 
discoveries  in  the  realm  of  nature  do  not  equal.  And  this 
miracle  of  language-forming  has  been  wrought,  forsooth, 
neither  by  Romish,  nor  Rationalistic,  but  solely  by  posi- 
tively Biblical  Christianity. 

This  also  is  a  fact,  that  the  places  of  the  higher  scientific 
as  well  as  the  popular  education  have  originated  in  the 
spirit  of  Biblical  Christianity.  The  materialistic  and  in- 
dustrial sense  of  our  day  is  pressing  boisterously  towards 
the  dominancy  of  the  so-called  real-schools.  It  remains  to 
be  seen,  whether  a  full-rounded,  complete  culture  will  pro- 
ceed from  them ;  they  do  not  yet,  like  the  classic  schools 
born  of  Christianity,  belong  to  history.  But  it  can  be 
already  seen  that  the  gymnasia  and  the  classical  training 
cared  for  by  them  can  be  defended  successfully  against  the 
assaults  of  industrialism  and  materialism  only  by  genuine 
Christianity. 

If  we  look  beyond  the  bounds  of  Europe,  at  those  peoples 
whose  culture  is  far  inferior  to  ours,  we  find  it  is  again 
Christianity  that  brings  to  them  also  the  scientific  institutes. 
"  Have,  then,"  asks  the  man  of  science  to  whom  I  have 
already  referred,  "  the  European  governments  and  academies 
only  a  far-oflf  merit  for  the  founding  of  the  scientific  and 
educational  establishments  of  Serampore,  Malacca,  Calcutta, 
Eimeo,  etc.,  compared  with  that  of  the  missionaries  and  the 
societies  which  send  them?  " 

The  individual  branches  of  science,  too,  are  largely  in- 
debted to  Christianity,  even  those  many  of  whose  repre- 
sentatives are  to-day  the  most  ungrateful  heirs  of  the 
scientific  treasures  of  their  great  predecessors,  —  I   mean 


CHRISTIANITY    AND   CULTURE  379 

the  natural  sciences.  From  the  womb  of  positive  Chri&' 
tianity  have  been  born  men  like  Copernicus,  Kepler, 
Haller,  Newton,  whose  labors  and  discoveries  belong,  in 
any  case,  to  the  foundation  and  corner-stones  of  the  present 
physics.  The  heart-throb  of  their  scientific  endeavor  was 
the  incitement  to  fathoming  the  works  of  God.  And  since 
this  incitement  is  an  inmost  impulse  of  Christianity  in 
general,  that  impulse  must  prompt,  and  continually,  to  the 
investigation  of  nature.  The  sins  which  have  been,  and 
will  be,  consciously  or  unconsciously  committed  under  the 
name  of  Christianit}'-  must  not  be  attributed  to  this  itself. 
Its  only  concern  is  that  what  actually  exists  be  most  fun- 
damentally searched  into  and  found  out ;  for  only  what 
actually  exists,  not  the  human  notion  of  the  same,  is  the 
work  of  God,  a  wa3'-mark  to  God  and  a  herald  of  his  glory. 
The  natural  science  which  in  these  daj^s  calumniously 
opposes  Christianity  takes  its  chief  weapons,  not  from  the 
actually  existing,  but  from  its  thoughts,  conclusions,  hy- 
potheses, about  the  same;  and  persuades  the  credulous 
multitude,  that  its  ephemeral  hypotheses,  which  like  waves 
displace  each  other,  are  the  facts  themselves.  This  fallacy, 
which  surely  does  not  promote  true  science,  Christianity 
contravenes.  Moreover,  it  relegates  natural  science  wiihin 
its  bounds,  namely,  within  the  realm  of  nature ;  reminds  it 
earnestly  that  there  is  another,  independent,  higher  realm, 
that  of  the  spiritual  life,  whose  laws  cannot  be  apprehended 
through  the  laws  of  nature  ;  saves  natural  science  from  the 
foolish,  unscientific  delusion,  that  it  is  the  only  and  the 
great  science  which  can  pass  valid  judgment  on  all  things, 
even  on  the  spiritual  life  ;  takes  it  out  of  its  isolation  and 
fitly  joins  it,  at  its  rightful  place,  into  the  great  organism 
of  the  universal  science  of  mankind.  Had  not  Christianity 
at  times  rendered  natural  science  this  service,  consciously 


380  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

or  unconsciously  to  the  latter,  it  would  long  since  have 
entirely  sunken  down  to  the  materialistic  lack  of  science. 

"While  I  remind  you,  only  as  it  were  in  passing,  of  what 
enrichments  the  knowledge  of  lands  and  peoples  has  ex- 
perienced through  the  Christian  missions,  I  direct  your 
attention  to  the  science  of  history.  Only  by  the  Christian, 
fundamental  view  of  a  development,  under  the  divine 
government  of  the  world,  of  the  human  race,  which  has  its 
starting  and  its  ending  point,  has  a  science  of  history  be- 
come possible.  Christianity  alone  names  to  us  a  definite 
germ  and  a  definite  termination  of  development.  Every 
non-Christian  view,  which  retains  the  idea  of  an  organic 
development,  makes  of  it  an  unending  process,  an  endless 
screw,  which  contradicts  the  nature  of  a  development. 
"  Not  all  events,"  says  Hamann  (i.,  55),  "  can  be  explained 
by  titles  and  reasons  of  state."  There  are  divine  purposes 
operative  in  human  affairs.  They  are  the  very  soul  of 
events.  When  these  are  unknown  or  overlooked,  then,  to 
use  again  the  language  of  Hamann,  must  "  our  history 
look  leaner  than  Pharaoh's  kine ;  however,  fairy-tales  and 
court-papers  supply  the  lack  in  our  historians  "  (ii.,  279). 
"  Can  one  know  the  past  when  he  does  not  even  understand 
the  present?  And  who  would  form  correct  conceptions 
of  the  present  without  knowing  the  future?  The  future 
determines  the  present,  and  this  the  past,  as  the  design 
nature, and  use  the  means"  (ii.,  217).  From  these  simple 
words  of  the  Magus  of  the  North  it  is  clear  why  only 
Biblical  Christianity  can  write  the  history  of  mankind.^ 

1  Even  a  Hegel  sets  up  the  Machiavelian  doctrine,  that  in  politics  ethics  do  not 
hold  good,  in  blunt  phrase  as  the  crown-point  of  his  philosophy :  "  The  history  of 
the  world  is  outside  of  the  etand-point  of  righteousness  and  virtue  "  (VIU.,  424).  In 
the  work  of  Kirchmann.  referred  to  above,  this  view  is  praised  as  the  highest 
wisdom,  and  it  is  taught  that  mankind  moves,  properly  speaking,  neither  forwards 
nor  backwards,  —  consequently,  no  development,  no  history,  exists.  Vol.  I.,  p. 
139  flf.,  160. 


CHRISTIANITY    AND    CULTURE  381 

We  come  to  philosophy.  If  he  onl}^  is  a  philosopher  who 
constructs  the  universe  exclusively  from  his  reason,  according 
to  his  intellectual  ability,  then,  it  is  true,  Christianity  is  the 
death  of  philosophy.  For  it  is  a  fundamental  presupposition 
of  Christianity  that  as  effort  by  the  law  only  brings  us  to  a 
knowledge  of  our  unrighteousness,  so  the  reason's  search 
only  reveals  the  impossibility  of  coming  by  that  means  to 
a  knowledge  of  the  truth.  The  history  of  philosophy  is 
old  enough  to  show  this.  Had  not  Christianity  exerted  an 
influence  on  our  philosophy  also,  and  breathed  into  it  some 
elements  of  truth,  the  impotency  of  philosophy  to  find  the 
truth  would  be  much  more  generally  seen.  Our  later 
philosophy  sets  itself  up  as  a  master  over  the  facts, 
instead  of  humbly  subjecting  itself  to  them  and  being 
taught  by  them.  That  is  not  science,  that  is  presumption. 
True  science  begins  with  self-know^ledge,  with  the  knowl- 
edge of  one's  limitations  and  of  the  recognition  due  to 
other  powers.  Of  this  modesty  the  non-Christian  philos- 
ophy knows  little.  On  the  contrarj^,  it  is  the  natural 
impulse  of  Christianity  conscientiously  to  regard  the  facts 
of  life,  both  those  of  the  relative,  the  human  life,  and 
those  of  the  absolute,  the  divine  life.  Life,  universal  Life, 
is  our  instructress,  not  a  dismembered  expression  or  faculty 
of  life,  like  Reason,  —  whose  soundness,  besides,  remains 
to  be  proved.^  Only  the  philosophy,  therefore,  which  has 
germinated  from  the  totalit}^  of  normal  life  can  also  lead 
to  the  consummation ;  while  a  philosophy  which  has  come 
from  a  dismembered  faculty  of  life  must  necessarily  prove 
one-sided.  If  this  is  correct,  then  it  is  clear  also  that  only 
from  Christianity  can  that  philosophy  which  is  a  mirror  of 

i"The  soundness  of  the  reason  is  the  cheapest,  most  arbitrary,  and  most 
shameless  pretension,  by  which  the  very  things  to  be  proved  are  taken  for  granted, 
and  all  free  investigation  is  excluded  more  violently  than  by  the  infallibility  of  the 
Roman  Catholic  Church."    Hamann,  vol.  rv.,  p.  324. 


382  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

the  truth  grow ;  because  only  Christianity  looks  upon  the 
normal,  the  redeemed  and  sanctified  life  in  God  and  from 
God  as  the  root  of  a  normal  knowledge.  The  vigorous 
germs  of  such  a  philosophy  we  have  ;  I  need  only  mention 
Hamann  and  Baader.  Their  unfolding,  the  future  will 
bring. 

It  is  left  yet  to  show  the  influence  of  Christianity  on 
art.  I  commence  with  architecture.  Visit  the  marble 
temple  of  Theseus  at  Athens,  —  the  single  completely  pre- 
served ancient  temple, —  then  hasten  to  Constantinople,  and 
enter  the  Hagia  Sophia.  While  the  interior  of  the  antique 
temple  shows  scarcely  the  attempt  at  a  dominion  of  the 
spirit  over  matter,  — the  expression  of  an  idea  by  the  struct- 
ure itself,  —  the  interior  of  the  church  of  Saint  Sophia  is, 
notwithstanding  the  Mohammedan  disfiguration,  the  clear 
and  grand  testimou}^  of  the  stones  that  the  people  of  God 
have  a  house  of  God  on  earth.  In  our  Gothic  cathedrals, 
architecture  has  celebrated  its  triumph.  Every  part  of  the 
building  is  in  itself  the  victory  of  the  spirit  over  the 
material,  of  heaven  over  earth  ;  every  part  cries,  Upward  ! 
And  every  one  of  the  innumerable  individual  existences 
adjusts  itself  readily  as  a  living  member  in  the  totality, 
and  the  totality  comprehends  the  language  of  all  the 
separate  parts  in  one  great  and  mighty  accord,  in  the 
words,  ''  Set  your  affection  on  things  above,  not  on  things 
of  the  earth  !  " 

This  impression  is  strengthened  by  the  art  of  painting ; 
specially  the  art  of  painting  on  glass.  It  shows  us  in  the 
transfiguration  of  which  the  colors  in  general  are  capable, 
symbolically  and  representatively,  tlie  powers  which  lib- 
erate us  from  the  earth  and  carry  us  up  into  the  trans- 
figuring light  of  heaven. 

This  brings  me  to  painting  in  general. 


CHRISTIANITY    AND    CULTURE  S8S 

"  Only  on  ecclesiastical  themes,"  says  Schnaase,^  "  can 
this  art  acquire  a  satisfactory,  permanent  style ;  without 
them,  it  becomes  unsteady  and  vacillating,  and  at  last  de- 
clines to  a  mere  play  of  talents,  to  an  idle  means  of  tickling 
the  senses.  Of  this  the  artists  themselves  are  sensible,  even 
those  who  are  little  touched  by  religious  motives." 

Imagine  that  of  the  number  of  our  pictures  which  pass  as 
masterpieces  all  those  were  destroyed  which  represent  per- 
sons and  occurrences  of  Biblical  and  of  ecclesiastical  his- 
tory, or  in  general  Christian  states  of  soul, —  what  would 
you  have  left?  The  unanimous  reply  to  this  question  shows 
most  forcibl}^  how  extraordinary  must  be  the  formative 
power  of  Christianity  in  this  province  of  art.  I  will  not  by 
enlarging  weaken  the  impression  of  this  simple  fact.  Allow 
me  in  but  a  word  to  point  out  the  internal  reason. 

Only  the  Biblical  Christian  view  of  history,  as  a  progres- 
sive revelation  of  the  being  and  will  of  God,  brings  unit}^ 
and  entireness  into  the  same ;  and  only  such  a  view  of  his- 
tor^^  can  produce  pictures  of  imperishable  worth. 

Again,  the  revelation  of  divine  glory  in  the  human  face, 
the  transfiguration  of  the  human  lowliness  into  the  divine 
elevation,  love  and  sacrifice  even  to  death,  victory  in  defeat, 
calmness  and  resignation  in  suffering,  the  beginning  of  bod- 
il}^  transfiguration  from  spiritual  purity  and  mildness, — 
these  and  similar  phenomena  of  life  will,  according  to  their 
natures,  always  form  the  principal  subjects  of  earnest,  rep- 
resentative art ;  because  they  off'er  the  most  beautiful,  most 
living,  most  speaking  forms.  And  they  all  are  truly  and 
in  their  completeness  to  be  found  only  in  Christianity. 
This  finds  its  application  in  principle  to  sculpture  also. 
Christianity  has  broken  through  the  narrow  barriers  which 
this  art  had  with  the  ancients,  and  endeavors  to  breathp 

1  Ueber  das  Verhaltniss  der  Kunet  zum  Ghriatendom. 


384 


THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 


even  into  stone  and  metal  something  else  than  bodily  beauty 
and  purity  of  form.  The  Christian  ideas  must  speak  also 
from  the  marble.  And  though,  it  is  true,  success  has  not 
yet  been  reached  in  full}'  reconciling  that  with  the  laws  of 
the  plastic  art,  yet  Lorenzo  Ghiberti,  in  the  reliefs  on  the 
so-called  Gates  of  Paradise  ;  Michel  Angelo,  in  his  Moses 
and  The  Descent  from  the  Cross ;  Peter  Vischer,  in  the 
statues  and  reliefs  on  the  Sebaldus  Monument ;  and  in  our 
times,  Dannecker,  in  his  colossal  Statue  of  Christ ;  Thor 
waldsen,  in  his  Christ  and  the  Twelve  Apostles, — have 
made  victorious  attempts  at  plastically  representing  all  the 
fulness  of  the  human  spirit  pervaded  by  the  divine. 

Follow  me  into  the  realm  of  music  and  singing. 

The  two  most  powerful  instruments  by  which  art  calls 
forth  sounds  are  the  bell  and  the  organ.  Both  are  children 
of  Christianity,  live  with  it,  and  with  it  would  perish.  The 
bell,  it  is  true,  has,  like  the  sea,  only  one  sound,  but  a 
sound  full  of  majesty  and  power,  full  of  alluring  clearness 
and  mysterious  depth  ;  and  in  company  with  its  sisters,  it 
sends  forth  from  the  heights  over  the  activity  of  the  world 
its  mighty  accord,  which  is  full  of  heavenly  peace,  and 
allures  to  heavenly  peace.  The  organ  is  the  most  complete 
musical  instrument  that  we  have  or  can  as  yet  on  the  whole 
conceive  of.  Force  and  mildness ;  the  thunder  and  roar 
which  rends  the  hearts  of  rocks,  and  the  still  small  voice  of 
Jehovah  ;  the  deep  complaint  of  the  anguished  conscience  ; 
the  exulting  praise  of  the  redeemed  spirit,  and  the  still,  uni- 
form quiet  of  the  forward-struggling  pilgrim ;  and  again 
the  glow  of  sacrificing  love,  the  storming  of  the  combatant 
in  the  realm  of  the  spirit,  and  the  victor's  song  of  triumph ; 
the  fervent  confession  of  the  individual  soul  and  of  the 
entire  communion,  and  all  else  that  rests  in  the  Christian 


CHRISTIANITY    AND    CULTURE  •:>«.3 

heart  and  in  the  Christian  people, —  this  rests  also  in  the 
organ  and  streams  forth  from  its  wonderful  mouth. 

They  who  long  since  tore  Christ  from  their  hearts  can- 
not resist  these  messengers  of  Christ,  —  the  tone  of  the  organ 
and  the  sound  of  the  bell, —  but  must  with  tears  confess  their 
calming,  saving  power,  as  is  a  thousand  times  to  be  read 
in  our  tales,  legends,  popular  songs,  and  even  in  the  poems 
of  our  infidels.  When  a  man  like  Burger  would  denote  the 
highest  and  most  beautiful,  he  sa3^s,  "  High  soundest  thou, 
song,  like  organ  tone  and  sound  of  bell."  And  even  from 
the  lips  of  a  Faust  the  tone  of  the  organ  and  the  bell's  sound 
draw  away  the  poisoned  cup. 

What  shall  I  say  of  singing  and  music?  How  long 
would  the  most  decided  worldlings  who  have  an  organ  for 
music  remain,  think  you,  at  concerts,  should  they  hear 
nothing  but  what  the  worldly  sense  has  produced,  and  be 
required  to  miss  all  that  bears  upon  itself  decidedly  or 
approximately  the  Christian  character?  Christianity  is  the 
kernel  of  our  music  ;  Christianity  has  raised  it  to  the  highest 
pitch  it  has  in  general  as  yet  attained.  I  need  onl}"  mention 
such  men  as,  in  the  south,  Palestrina,^  and  in  our  north, 
Handel  and  Bach.  Since  Beethoven  styled  Bach  the  "  first 
parent  of  harmony,"  and  Mendelssohn  Barthold}^  turned 
the  hearts  of  the  children  of  art  to  the  fathers,  even  apos- 
tates from  Christianity  have  been  praising  the  creative 
father.  Many  men,  whose  judgments  are  considered  good 
authority  in  this  department,  call  him  the  greatest  of 
musicians.  Think  you  of  Handel,  then  3'ou  must  not  for- 
get that  the  bloom  of  his  music  belongs  to  the  period  of  his 
later  development,  after  he,  at  Aix  la  Chapelle,  physically 
by  the  bath,  spiritually  by  the  Spirit  of  Christ,  had  been  as 

1  Palestrina's  teacher  was  Claude  Goudimel,  the  Reformed  creator  of  the  psalm- 
melodies,  -who  fell  a  martyr,  on  the  night  of  Sunt  Bartholomew,  in  Paris. 


386  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

it  were  born  anew.  Not  the  single  Christian  individuals 
who  are  called  Bach  and  Handel  produced  the  Bachian  and 
Handelian  music,  but  the  spirit  of  Christianity.  Without 
Biblical  Christianity,  Bachian  and  Handelian  music  is  in- 
conceivable. 

Tarry  j^et  a  moment  with  the  choral.  I  du  not  here 
speak  of  what  incalculable  influence  the  same  has  on  our 
spiritual  and  ecclesiastical  life ;  I  only  pray  you  to  consider 
what  position  it  occupies  in  music.  Many  words  are  un- 
necessary. The  masters  of  art  bow  themselves  before  the 
choral.  And  who  produced  this  pearl  of  art?  Positive 
Biblical  Christianity. 

At  last  I  lead  you  to  the  crown  of  all  art,  to  poetry. 
Taking  our  stand  preliminarily  with  the  last  century  of 
German  literature,  and  from  that  point  surveying  the  whole 
earlier  development  of  culture,  we  are  greeted  by  the  fact, 
that,  so  to  speak,  all  classical  and  world-historic  works  of 
a  poetical  character  have  sprung  from  the  Christian  spirit. 
Right  at  the  beginning  of  the  history  of  our  German  litera- 
ture stands  the  Heliand,  a  work  in  which  the  most  original, 
strongest  nationality  is  in  so  entirely  living  and  genuine  a 
way  pervaded  by  the  spirit  of  Christianity,  that  it  must  be 
called  as  primitive^  Christian  as  it  is  primitively  German. 
Quite  as  clear  a  mirror  of  German  Christianity  are  the 
chief  poets  of  the  first  flowering-time  of  our  literature.  Our 
two  great  popular  epics,  the  Nibelungen  and  Gudrun,  come 
as  to  their  original  legendary  content  from  pagan  times ; 
this  has,  however,  like  the  whole  German  people,  been  re- 
generated to  a  new  life  by  Christianity.  Both  epics  busy 
themselves  with  the  fundamental  presuppositions  of  Chris- 
tianity, with  the  first  article  of  the  Christian  faith. 

After  brief  joy  and  glory,  which  springs  not  from  divine 
soil,  ensues  long  sorrow  and  great  barbarism.     That  sings 


CHRISTIANITY    AND    CULTURE  387 

the  Nibelungenlied.  The  reverse  the  song  of  Gudrun; 
after  long  and  deep  sorrow,  which  is  endured  in  communion 
with  God  and  leads  to  God,  ensues  great  joy  and  pro- 
found peace  for  princes  and  peoples.  To  understand  the 
character  and  fate  of  Chrimhild,  as  also  of  Gudrun,  notice 
the  power  which  attaches  these  two  women  to  their  hus- 
bands. With  Chrimhild  it  is  the  noble  and  strong  glow 
of  natural  affection ;  you  know  how  Chrimhild  becomes 
disfigured  by  it  to  a  Megaera.  With  Gudrun  it  is  the 
divine  regulation  which  binds  wife  and  husband  for  always 
together.  Only  by  the  strength  of  this  divine  regulation 
did  she  so  endure  the  severest  trouble  that  precisely  from 
the  depth  of  disgrace  her  glory  beams  forth  most  brightly. 

The  jewel  of  our  art-poetry  is  Wolfram  von  Eschenbach's 
Percival,  the  real  harbinger  of  the  German  Reformation. 
Percival  is  the  German,  the  German  people.  He  is  seized 
with  a  longing,  which  on  natural  principles  cannot  be 
explained,  whose  origin  and  end  he  does  not  at  first  him- 
self understand.  But  he  has  to  follow  it,  even  though  to 
do  so  seems  foolish.  Nothing  on  earth  satisfies  the  crav- 
ing, not  man's  power,  nor  man's  deeds,  not  fame,  not  glory, 
not  woman's  love,  nor  any  earthly  charm.  But  as  urgent 
as  is  this  longing,  it  is  nevertheless  of  itself  unable,  though 
pressed  near  thereto,  to  perceive  and  grasp  the  object  by 
which  alone  it  can  be  satisfied.  This  natural  yearning  for 
God  and  heaven  must  also  experience  the  descent  into  hell, 
—  the  hell  of  repentance ;  thus  it  comes  to  the  goal,  in  the 
kingdom  where  God  in  Christ  dwells  among  men  and  com- 
municates to  them  his  living  and  sanctifying  energies. 

Perhaps  the  most  beautiful,  most  amiable  embodiment  of 
a  German  sort  is  Walther  von  derVogelweide.  The  kernel- 
point  of  his  life  is  life  in  God  through  Christ.  From  this 
as  the  centre,  his  feelings,  meditations,  thoughts,  volitions. 


388 


THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 


—  all  are  ruled  and  sanctified.  His  love  for  women  and 
friends,  for  home  and  country,  roots  and  culminates  iu  the 
love  of  God  and  Christ.  It  is  only  needful  to  remember 
that  song,  where  he,  a  young  man,  in  the  midst  of  blooming 
nature,  sat  meditatively  on  a  stone,  leg  crossing  leg,  chin 
and  cheek  buried  in  his  hand,  and  reflected  on  the  one 
thought,  how  a  person  ought  to  live  on  the  earth.  Three 
treasures  should  be  together  in  one  shrine :  honor,  good. 

and 

The  third  is  God's  grace  and  faithfulness 
Than  this  both  the  others  are  worth  less. 

In  Italy,  somewhat  later,  Dante  Alighieri  sang  his 
Comedy,^  which  after-generations  have  called  the  divine. 
The  plastic  strength,  the  beauty  and  grandeur  of  the  forms  ; 
their  clearness  and  transparency ;  their  manifoldness,  and 
again  their  organic  unity,  —  is  surpassed  by  no  work  of  a 
poetic  description.  What  Dante  himself  says  of  another 
of  his  poems  holds  good,  in  the  fullest  sense,  respecting  the 
Divine  Comedy :  that  to  all  who  pass  by  and  understand 
not  its  meaning,  it  says  at  least.  Just  see  how  beautiful  I 
am !  And  in  fact  all  hearts  are  bewitched  by  the  beauty 
and  elevation  of  the  poetic  art  in  this  Comedy.  And  it  is 
a  genuine  child  of  Christianity. 

Over  three  hundred  years  afterward,  Milton,  in  his 
Paradise  Lost,  considered  from  the  starting-point  through- 
out, poetically  shaped  the  Biblical  Christian  view  regard- 
ing the  development  of  our  race.  Milton  passes  without 
dispute  as  the  first  poet  of  England,  i.  e.,  the  first  after 
Shakespeare ;  and  the  strength  and  music  of  his  verse,  in 
general  the  classical  qualities  of  his  poetic  language,  the 

1  That  is,  village-song.  Far  from  the  City  of  Q-od  lives  the  man  on  the  earth,  in  a 
miserable  village,  as  if  banished,  and  sings  of  the  way  to  the  Eternal  City  of  Home 
and  of  its  wonders. 


CHRISTIANITY    AND    CULTURE  389 

Englishman  prizes  as  an  inexhaustible  fountain  of  art- 
refreshment. 

But  what  position  does  Shakespeare  himself,  this  hero- 
poet  who  is  above  all  comparison,  take  towards  Christianity? 
He  is  to  be  styled  its  secular  prophet.  For  all  the  Shakes- 
pearean dramas,  without  exception,  call  to  us:  There 
reigns  in  humanity  a  corrupting  principle  which  inheres  in 
even  the  noblest  phenomena,  and  spoils  them  at  the  very 
time  of  their  bloom  ;  in  the  whole  human  race  is  to  be  found 
no  power  which  could  redeem  from  this  corruption.  In  the 
most  terrible  way  is  revealed  in  the  history  of  individuals 
and  of  peoples  the  condemning  and  destroying  righteous- 
ness of  God.  The  recognition  of  this  fact,  which  leads  to 
repentance,  is  the  necessary  precondition  and  even  the 
beginning  of  the  Christian  view  ;  for  only  by  the  knowledge 
that  man  and  the  human  race  have  in  themselves  no  power 
of  effecting  redemption  is  the  eye  opened  for  the  grace  of 
God,  which  hovers  over  the  tremendous  chaos  of  human 
sin,  and,  in  the  blood-soaked  field  of  ruin,  in  a  wonderful 
way,  plants  new  life-germs,  that  spring  up,  bloom,  bear 
fruit.  To  be  sure,  this  last  point  is  not  brought  out  by 
Shakespeare  with  that  manifoldness  and  extensiveness  with 
which  the  first  is ;  but  it  is  clearly  and  decidedly  intimated. 
Human  sin,  then,  and  divine  grace,  the  cardinal  points 
of  Christianity,  are  also  the  cardinal  points  of  Shakes- 
peare's dramas.  Withal,  Shakespeare  holds  fast  intrepidly, 
as  positive  Christianity  does,  the  foundations  of  society, 
the  sacredness  of  marriage,  of  the  parental  authority,  of  the 
state  ordinance,  of  the  divine  majesty. 

"  The  man  belongs  to  us ! "  Shakespearean  poetry  is  with- 
out Biblical  Christianity  inconceivable. 

Concerning  Shakespeare's  great  cotemporary  in  Spain, 
Calderon   de   la  Barca,  I   must   employ  more   condensed 


390  THE   BREMEN    LECTURES 

expression.  From  every  production  of  this  man  breathes 
his  genial  poetic  vigor ;  that  is  readily  conceded  by  all  art- 
critics.  When  he  makes  the  Biblical  Christianity,  still 
concealed,  though  buried,  in  Roman  Catholicism  the 
animating  power  of  his  art,  then  he  rises  to  the  heights  of 
art ;  as  soon,  however,  as  he  puts  into  fixed  forms  designedly 
and  exclusively  the  specifically  Romish  view  of  Christianity, 
then  he  makes  —  that  one  still  always  feels  —  truly  horrid 
caricatures.  Even  a  hasty  analysis  of  the  chief  Shakes- 
pearean and  Calderonian  dramas,  which  would  bring  to 
view  what  has  been  said,  the  shortness  of  the  time  forbids. 

Such  of  the  tragedies  from  the  so-called  classic  period  of 
the  French  poetry  as  are  yet  to  us  in  some  degree  palata- 
ble, the  Esther  and  Athalie  of  Racine,  owe  their  flavor  to 
the  salt  and  vigor  of  the  Bible.  By  the  by,  I  will  here 
mention,  —  it  may  be  interesting  to  you,  at  all  events  it  is 
characteristic,  —  that  even  those  of  Voltaire's  dramas  which 
possess  a  trace  of  life  and  poetry,  the  Zaire  and  the  Alzire, 
are  pervaded  by  Christian  life-emotions.^ 

But  let  us  now  return  to  the  poetry  of  our  fatherland, 
with  which  we  began.  Scarcely  had  Biblical  Christianity 
been  by  the  Reformation  shelled  from  mediaeval  Catholi- 
cism and  revivified,  when  immediately  sprang  up,  in  our 
German  Evangelical  hymn,  a  new  vigorous  branch  of  art, 
which  to  this  day  has  continued  bearing  so  many  and  such 
refreshing  flowers  and  fruits  as  hardly  another.  In  our 
genuine  hymns  with  their  choral  melodies,  art  has  become 
the  common  property  of  the  people.  Had  we  them  not, 
then  we  should  have  scarcely  anything  really  and  truly 
national  that  is  understood  by  all  grades  of  education 
alike,  and  alike  satisfies  all.     With  reverence  stand  even 

1  Of  the  Zaire  it  is  said  in  the   preliminary  remarks,  "On  I'appelle  k    Paris 
trag^die  Chretienne." 


CHRISTIANITY    AND    CULTURE  391 

the  historians  of  literature  —  as  Gervinus  —  before  the 
classic  hymn.  The  educating,  hallowing,  ennobling  influ- 
ence which  it  has  on  our  people  is  incalculable  And  this 
spiritual  song,  the  child  of  positive  Biblical  Christianity, 
becomes  the  most  insipid,  miserable  abortion  as  soon  as 
Biblical  Christianity  is  deserted.  Witness  the  ridiculously 
pitiable  figures  which  the  rationalism  of  the  past  and 
present  century  has  made  of  the  old  hymns  of  the  church, 
or  the  dead,  hung-with-bells  phantoms  and  mummies  of 
so-called  hymns  which  the  spirit-of-the-age  Christianity  has 
produced.  Not  only  a  man  like  the  minister  Stein,  but  an 
exclusive  artist  like  Winkelmann,  is  overpowered  with 
indignation,  when  compelled  to  see  the  abuses  which  the 
tastelessness  of  infidelity  has  inflicted  on  the  hymn. 

It  was  the  hj^mn  that,  in  the  saddest  times  of  our 
people,  saved  German  poetry  from  entirely  perishing, 
until  the  so-called  second  blooming-period  dawned.  This 
also  confessedly  proceeded  from  Christian  it}',  from  Klop- 
stock's  Messias ;  and  could  the  poet  have  represented 
Biblical  Christianity  purer  and  stronger,  less  marred  by 
his  feelings  and  pathos,  his  poem  would  have  won  for 
itself  as  a  work  of  art  a  wholl}'  different  significance,  — 
that  is  unquestionable.  Now  the  Messias  closes  the  old 
time  in  which  Christianity  was  the  predominant  view ;  it 
showed  itself,  however,  incompetent  to  subdue  the  new 
humane  development  which  sprouted  up  in  the  midst  of 
Christianity.  The  chiefs  of  our  new  poetry  are  children 
and  promoters  of  this  development  without  God  ;  neverthe- 
less, their  principal  works  are  witnesses  for  the  Christian 
view,  though  in  a  diflferent  way.  I  select  only  Goethe's 
Faust  and  Iphigenie.  The  former,  Faust,  once  living  in 
God,  then  apostatizing  from  him  and  developing  himself 
from  the  forces  of  human  nature,  sinks  down  to  unreasou 


392  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

m  the  witch-kitchen  aud  vulgarity  on  the  Brocken.  Iphi 
genie  lives  and  moves  steadfastly  in  deity,  is  led  and 
ruled  by  it,  obtains  through  deity  the  victory  over  herself 
and  over  falsehood,  and  becomes  thus  the  foundress  of 
peace  and  reconciliation. 

The  dramas  in  which  Goethe  does  not  allow  himself  to 
mirror  the  objective  truth  of  history  and  life,  but  presents 
his  own  views,  are  not  really  works  of  art ;  e.  g.,  Stella 
and  the  second  part  of  Faust.  The  unchristian  subjective- 
ness  which  he  would  make  good  or  plausible  has,  in  these 
productions,  killed  his  poetic  genius.  That  reveals,  to  him 
who  is  willing  to  see,  the  culture-inimical,  more  definitely 
the  art-inimical  power  of  un-Christian  and  anti-Christian 
wisdom.  Much  more  unmistakablj'^  and  affectingly  does  this 
appear  with  Lord  Byron  and  Heimlich  Heine.  Both  are 
men  of  eminent  talent  for  art.  Both  have  sung  imperisha- 
ble songs,  and,  indeed,  only  when  they  permitted  themselves 
to  be  brought  by  the  spirit  of  discipline  to  an  objective 
apprehension.^  Both,  however,  intentionally  resisted  the 
Spirit  of  discipline  which  proceeds  from  the  Father  and 
the  Son,  and  so  committed  a  shameful  suicide  on  their 
poetic  geniuses.  Heine's  art  sank  below  mediocrity. 
Of  Lord  Byron  says  a  man  who  himself  breathes  not 
the  air  of  Christianity,  he  is  like  an  eagle  that,  on  broad- 
extended  wings,  mounts  up  to  the  highest  height,  — 

"  Yet  not  thus  does  he  strive  to  reach  the  sun; 
He  looks  with  sharp  eye  round  for  —  carrion. 
Nowhere  gleams  there  of  hope  one  single  ray ; 
'Tis  only  hell,  no  heaven  in  the  lay."  * 

Restless,  wild,  demoniacal,  like  Byron's  life,  is  Byron's  aj't. 

1  It  is  only  necessary  to  think  of  Heine's  poem  beginning,  "  Du  bist  wie  eine 
Blume,"  or  the  one  entitled  "  Frieden." 
»  By  Zedlitz,  Todtenkriiuze,  s.  81  and  82. 


CHRISTIANITY    AND   CULTURE  393 

Here  we  may  stop.  We  have  wandered  through  tho 
principal  domains  of  culture.  The  retrospect  which  we 
have  cast  over  more  than  a  thousand  years'  history  shows 
incontestably  what  creative  and  preservative  power  Chris- 
tianity has  exercised  in  all  cultural  realms  ;  while  the  apos- 
tasy from  Biblical  Christianity,  whether  it  happen  on  the 
side  of  superstition  or  on  that  of  unbelief,  undermines  the 
bases  of  culture.  The  more  thoroughly  and  conscientiously 
the  study  of  history  is  prosecuted,  the  more  will  the  gen- 
eral and  meagre  outlines  which  I  have  in  this  lecture  been 
able  to  sketch  become  transfigured  before  your  eyes  into 
living  and  loud-speaking  figures.  Notwithstanding  this 
testimony  of  histoiy,  the  prevailing  current,  forsooth,  which 
neither  proceeds  from  divine  revelation  nor  is  willing  to  be 
guided  by  it,  is  blind  and  presumptuous  enough  to  praise 
itself  loudly  as  the  only  fostress  of  culture,  and  to  put  Chris- 
tianity in  the  pillory  as  the  foe  of  culture.  Alas,  very  many 
of  our  cotemporaries,  who  pronounce  belief  in  the  living 
God  and  in  his  voice  in  nature,  history,  and  revelation,  to 
be  unscientific  unreason,  believe  this  palpable  lie,  surrender 
themselves  to  the  humane  superstitious  belief  in  erring 
humanity,  and  would  persuade  us  that  this  superstition  and 
its  doctrine  are  science.  What  shall  we  do?  Shall  we 
turn  from  belief  in  God  to  superstitious  faith  in  infirm 
humanity  and  to  disbelief  in  God?  Shall  we,  as  not  a  few 
advise  us,  so  doctor  up  Christianity  as  that  by  its  inocula- 
tion with  the  culture  of  infidelity  and  superstition  we  poi- 
son it  ?  Far  be  it !  We  will  not  spoil  the  salt  of  the  earth. 
For  if  the  salt  has  lost  its  savor,  wherewith  shall  one  salt  ? 
We  are  willing  to  see  and  admit  that  much  superstition  and 
infidelity,  much  of  the  flesh  and  the  world,  has  found  way 
into  Christianity,  and  that  thence  many  and  grievous  sins 
even  against  culture  have  flowed,  sins  which  enemies  have 


394  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

charged  to  Christianity  itself.  But  the  remedy,  surely,  can- 
not be  to  take  up  yet  more  poison,  I  mean  yet  more 
superstition  and  infidelity  into  the  Christian  life-blood,  but 
to  cleanse  this  from  all  that  is  unchristian  or  contrary  to 
Christianity,  and  to  build  up  ourselves  on  our  most  holy 
faith. 

"  Ye  shall  know  them  by  their  fruits."  Let  the  un- 
christian and  anti-Christian  development  exhibit  in  more 
than  a  thousand  years'  history  the  fruits  of  its  cultuie.^ 
Already  from  the  materialism  of  science  and  life,  from  the 
morass  of  foul  literature,  from  the  religious,  political,  and 
social  cry  of  the  times,  arises  a  strong  smell  of  corruption. 
The  hidden,  but,  alas,  even  frightfully  large  and  deep 
cloacae  we  will  leave  closed.  God  forbid  that  they  should 
ever  be  opened.  The  noble  plant  of  culture  would,  in  their 
pestilential  atmosphere,  suffocate. 

But  let  us  ask  the  apostles  and  prophets  of  this  God- 
estranged  development,  what  they  themselves  hold  as  to 
the  future  of  their  culture.  Schiller  may  speak,  who  for 
the  last  ten  years  has  been  by  many  half-deified.  Although 
he  stands  in  the  midst  of  the  Christian  era,  although  he 
has  modelled  his  language  after  the  language  of  the  Lutheran 
Bible,  yet  to  him  Christianity  is  an  abandoned,  childish 
stand-point.  There  was  never  any  especial  need  of  Chris- 
tianity to  come  so  far  as  mankind  has  come  ;  for  what  it  has 

1 1  must  once  more  cite  Herr  Von  Elirchmann,  standing  as  he  does  on  the  height 
of  the  times,  that  one  may  know  what  hie  contemporaries  think  about  culture  and 
training.  "  By  culture  and  training,"  it  is  said  in  the  above-mentioned  work, 
vol.  I.,  p.  106,  "  is  to  be  understood  not  so  much  an  increased  knowing  or  a  greater 
morality  as  a  susceptibility,  altered  with  respect  to  the  crude  man.  for  the  causes 
of  pleasure  and  pain.  .  .  Cultivation  belongs  to  the  realm  of  pleasure,  and  has 
nothing  to  do  with  morality.  .  .  Neither  does  cultivation  increase  the  sum  of 
pleasure  or  of  happiness ;  but  it  alters  only  the  kinds  of  pleasure,  of  which  happi 
ness  is  compounded.  The  crude  man,  nay,  the  beast,  can  be  as  happy  in  degree 
aH  the  cultivated  man,  but  not  in  kind." 


CHRISTIANITY    AND   CULTURE  395 

acquired  and  by  fighting  gained,  it  possesses  of  itself  and 
by  itself.  In  his  century,  as  it  is  said  in  the  Artists,  man 
already  was  "  the  ripest  son  of  Time,  free  through  Reason, 
strong  through  Law,  Lord  of  Nature,  which  loves  his 
bonds."  Art  and  science  have  brought  man  so  far.  Art 
will  lead  man  to  the  consummation. 

*'  At  last  what  has  as  poetry  been  nurst, 
Shall  a^  a  happy  inspiration  burst, 
And  flash  once  more  in  glory,  —  on  that  day 
Man  comes  to  truth,  to  which  now  tends  his  way." 

This  is  about  the  view  of  entire  humanism.  Whether  for 
the  words  "poetry"  and  "  happy  inspiration  "  some  other 
catch-terms  or  modes  of  expression  are  adopted,  is  im- 
material. Nevertheless,  this  false  doctrine  of  humanit}-, 
which  superstitiously  clings  to  its  fancies,  is  troubled  with 
disbelief  in  its  own  gods.  Read  Schiller's  Walk.  The 
glowing  picture  of  the  seemingly  most  beautiful,  grandest 
cultural  life  rises  before  j^ou.  Art,  science,  laws,  the 
state,  —  all  are  most  luxuriantly  blooming. 

"  Then  melt  before  the  startled  gaze  the  works  of  night, 
Delusions  old,  —  o'er  all  now  pours  the  morning  light. 
Man,  happy,  breaks  his  bonds." 

Happy  man,  indeed !  In  the  same  verse,  in  the  same 
breath,  in  which  Schiller  describes  man,  on  the  summit  of 
culture,  in  the  light  of  humane  truth  and  freedom  as  so 
happy,  he  must  after  all  confess  that  this  culture  is  rotten, 
hopelessly  lost.  For  when  it  is  at  the  highest,  then  the 
rein  of  Shame  is  snapped  ;  wild  Desire  shrieks  for  freedom  ; 
all  staggers;  there  is  error  even  in  the  bosom  of  God; 
Truth,  Faith,  Fidelity,  are  displaced  by  Falsehood  ;  the  holy 


396  THE    BREMEN    LECTURES 

insignia  of  Trutji  are  usurped  by  Deceit ;  Justice  and  Law 
have  become  vaunting  spectres. 

"  For  years,  for  centuries,  may  the  mummies  tLere 
Mock  the  warm  life  whose  lying  shape  they  wear, 
Till  nature  once  more  from  her  sleep  awake. 
Till  to  dust  the  hollow  fabric  shake 
Beneath  your  hands.  Avenging  Powers  Sublime, 
Your  heavy  iron  hands.  Necessity  and  Time. 
Then,  as  some  tigress  from  the  grated  bar 
Bursts  sudden,  mindful  of  her  wastes  afar, 
Deep  in  Numidian  glooms.  Humanity, 
Fierce  in  the  wrath  of  wretchedness  and  crime, 
Forth  from  the  city's  blazing  ashes  breaks, 
And  the  lost  nature  it  has  pined  for  seeks. 
Open,  ye  walls,  and  let  the  prisoner  free ! 
Safe  to  forsaken  fields  back  let  the  wild  one  flee ! "  ^ 

The  picture  is  true.  The  God-estranged  culture  leads, 
as  history  narrates  and  Schiller  sings  to  us,  to  corruption 
and  wretchedness,  and  ends,  though  individual  branches 
of  the  culture  continue  for  a  time  to  excite  the  admiration 
of  the  world,  at  last  in  universal  barbarism.  But  to 
believe  with  Schiller  that  a  return  to  forsaken  fields  will 
save  the  lost  humanity  and  its  rotten  culture  is  to  pay 
homage  to  a  more  than  heathenish  and  popish  superstition. 
We  have  need  of  another  Saviour  for  our  persons  as  well 
as  for  our  culture.  We  know  the  Saviour  and  the  culture 
that  he  has  achieved. 

Surrounded  by  the  facts  of  impartial  history  as  loud- 
speaking  witnesses,  and  well  aware  of  what  mankind 
possesses  in  Biblical  Christianity  and  its  culture,  we  are 
disturbed  by  neither  the  pretension  nor  the  calumny  of  the 

1  Edward  Bulwer  Lytton's  Translation  (The  Poems  and  Ballads  of  Schiller) 
pp.  213,  214. 


CHRISTIANITY    AND    CULTURE  397 

Spirit  of  the  Times,  though  its  prophets  and  priests  are 
many.  We  know  that  Christ  is  the  Life,  and  the  Life  is 
the  Light  of  men,  and  remain  mindful  of  the  injunction, 
"Hold  that  fast  which  thou  hast,  that  no  man  take 
thy  crown. 


GENERAL  INDEX 


Acts  of  Pilate,  292. 

Adhemar's  theory  of  the  eccentricity 
of  earth's  orbit,  98. 

Africa,  accounts  of  circumnavigation 
disbelieved  by  Herodotus,  77. 

Airy,  on  the  earth's  oblateness,  85. 

Aix  la  Chapelle,  residence  for  a  time 
of  Handel,  3^5. 

Alexander  the  Great,  his  expedition 
to  the  East,  77. 

Angelo,  Michael,  his  "  Moses "  and 
"  Descent  from  the  Cross,"  384. 

Antelope  with  one  horn,  83. 

"Antigone,  The,"  of  Sophocles,  trifling 
judgment  regarding  marriage,  353. 

Apollo  Belvedere,  statue  of,  355. 

Apostles'  Creed,  50. 

Architecture,  influence  of  Christianity 
upon,  382. 

Argyle,  Duke  of,  "  Recent  Specula- 
tions on  Primeval  Man,"  99. 

Aristophanes :  his  observation  on 
piety,  124 ;  on  putrefaction  of  an- 
cient Greek  culture,  352 ;  his  times, 
359. 

Aristotle :  accented  the  unity  of  God 
as  a  requirement  of  reason,  125; 
his  mistaken  ideas  of  culture,  357, 
358 ;  taught  the  personality  of  Deity, 
364 ;  his  views  of  relation  between 
rich  and  poor,  371. 

Atheism :  described,  21-23 ;  protest 
against,  29 ;  argument  on  which  it 
rests,  32. 

Athens,  Ruined  temples  of,  354. 

Atomic  theory,  86,  94. 

Atonement,  The  Scriptural  Doc- 
trine OF,  253-275. 

Atterbom,  recognized  the  intuitive 
consciousness  of  man,  312. 

Auberlen,  Die  Gbttliche  Offenbarung,  85. 

Ausland,  German  magazine,  referred 
to,  79,  80,  82,  99,  101. 


Baader:  approaches  Christian  view 
of  the  Trinity,  61;  indicated  the 
germs  of  a  Christian  philosophy,  3«2. 

Baalbec,  ruined  temples  there,  354. 

Bach,  the  "first  parent  of  harmony," 
385. 

Baco  de  Verulam,  opposed  the  Coper- 
nican  system  of  astronomy,  80. 

Baffin,  the  discoverer  of  Baffin's  Bay, 
78. 

Barbarians,  the  Greeks  knew  only 
themselves  and  barbarians,  356. 

Barca,  Calderon  de  la,  his  poetry  as 
affected  by  Christianity,  389,  390. 

Barnabas,  Epistle  of,  293. 

Barrow,  Sir  John,  78. 

Basilides,  heretical  teacher  of  second 
century,  290. 

Easier  Missions- Magazin,  80. 

Bauer,  on  resurrection  of  Christ,  217. 

Beethoven,  385. 

Bell,  The,  a  child  of  Christianity,  384. 

Bernoulli,  opposed  Newton's  system 
of  gravitation,  80. 

Berzelius,  one  of  the  authors  of  atomic 
theory,  94. 

Bessel,  made  investigations  of  earth's 
oblateness,  85. 

Bible,  the  Sinaitic,  287. 

Billed  animal  discovered  in  New  Hol- 
land, 82. 

Blood,  discovery  of  its  circulation,  83. 

Blumenbach,  a  noted  physiologist,  72. 

Braniss,  on  Christianity  and  philos- 
ophy, 61. 

Brewster,  David,  referred  to,  80. 

Brocken,  journeys  to  the,  76. 

Bryant,  translation  by,  of  Homer.  3.56. 

Buddhism,  contains  materialism,  24. 

Biichner :  a  leading  German  material- 
ist, 24 ;  quoted,  155. 

Burger,  appreciation  of  the  organ  and 
bell,  385. 


400 


GENERAL    INDEX 


Burmeister,  author  of  "History  of 
Creation,"  91. 

Burton,  an  African  explorer,  79. 

Byron,  killed  his  own  genius  by  re- 
sisting Christian  discipline,  392. 

Caesar,  Augustus,  corruption  at  work 
in  grandeur  of  his  times,  359. 

Csesarea-Philippi,  place  where  Jesus 
disclosed  his  Messiahship,  253. 

Cassini,  opposed  Newton's  system  of 
gravitation,  80. 

Castor,  Agrippa,  a  contemporary  of 
Basilides,  290. 

Celsus,  early  opponent  of  Christianity, 
291. 

China:  visited  by  Marco  Polo,  78; 
early  history  of,  recently  explored, 
99 ;  one  of  the  only  two  non-Chris- 
tian empires  yet  remaining,  374. 

Chinese,  to  them  Western  peoples  are 
only  red-bristled  barbarians,  353. 

Choral,  the,  influence  of  Christianity 
upon,  386. 

Chrimhild,  a  character  in  poem  of 
Gudrun,  387. 

Christlieb,  Dr.  Theodor,  his  lecture, 
19. 

Cicero,  his  question  touching  the  uni- 
versal belief  of  men  in  the  divine, 
23. 

Cochineal,  an  insect,  82. 

Cold,  as  a  disease  not  yet  fully  under- 
stood by  physicians,  87. 

Colebrook,  a  Himalaya  explorer,  78. 

Columbus :  great  faith  of,  72 ;  not  ap- 
preciated by  his  own  generation,  78. 

Commune,  atheism  of  the,  22. 

Cooley,  a  London  geographer,  79. 

Conscience,  discovered  first  by  Chris- 
tianity, known  by  Romans  only  as 
consciousness  of  guilt,  treated  by 
Plato  as  an  exercise  of  the  memory, 
129. 

Confessionalists,  the,  different  classes 
of,  in  Germany,  315. 

Conservation  of  force,  opposed  yet  by 
eminent  scientists  on  ground  of  un- 
explained difficulties,  86. 

Copernicus :  needed  faith  to  make  his 
astronomical  discoveries,  72 ;  one  of 
the  "  heroes  of  science."  152. 


Cosmogonies,  the  Etruscan  and  Per- 
sian, specify  that  the  world  was 
created  in  six  thousand  years,  92, 93. 

Council,  The  Tridentine,  361,  376. 

Creation,  The  Doctrine  of,  and 
Natural  Science,  69-104. 

Creed,  the  Athanasian,  its  peculiar- 
ities and  defects,  50-52. 

Cremer,  Hermann,  d.  d.,  his  lecture, 
109. 

Cross,  lines  upon  "  Religion  of  the," 
etc.,  365. 

Culture,  Christianity  and,  349-397. 

Culture  and  cultus,  350. 

Croll,  James,  theory  respecting  the 
eccentricity  of  the  earth's  orbit,  98. 

Cuvier,  testimony  respecting  the  Perca 
Scandens,  or  flying  fish,  82. 

Czolbe,  a  prominent  German  writer 
and  materialist,  24. 

Daimachus,    ancient    authority    on 

India,  77. 
Dalton,  the  atomic  theory  of,  94. 
Dana,  American  geologist,  99. 
Dannecker,  his  statue  of  Christ,  384. 
Dante,  "Divine  Comedy  "of,  born  of 

Christianity,  377,  388. 
Darwin :  has  a  remnant  of  belief  in 

a  living,  personal  Deity,  73 ;  draws 

his  weapons  from  the  Lyellian  quiet- 
ism, 94. 
De  Brahe,  Tycho,  opposed  the  Coper- 

nican  system,  80. 
Des  Cartes,  opposed  Newton's  system 

of  gravitation,  80. 
De  Groot,  supports  Tischendorf  as  to 

origin  of  Gospels,  294. 
De  La  Hire,  the  cochineal  an  insect, 

82. 
Deism  :  its  conception  of  God,  26,  27 ; 

protest  against,  30-32;  truth  in,  35, 

36 ;  see  also  158-163. 
Delitzsch,  on  the  Trinity,  59. 
Disselhoff,  Rev.  Julius,  his  lecture,  349. 

Earth,  oblateness  of,  85,  86. 
Earthquakes,  in  South  America,  and 

one  which  destroyed  Lisbon,  97. 
Ebionism,  a  legalistic  tendency,  315. 
Egypt,  earliest  history  of,  too  recent  to 

agree  with  the  Lyellian  chronology, 


GENERAL   INDEX 


401 


Electricity,  obscurities  regarding,  S7. 

Empires,  duration  of  ancient  com- 
pared with  modern,  374,  375. 

Epicureans,  were  materialists,  24. 

Ephesus,  temple  ruins  there,  354. 

Esquimaux,  think  only  themselves  to 
be  innuit  or  man,  353. 

Eucharist,  celebrated  in  Asia  Minor 
on  Hth  of  Nisan,  295. 

Eusebius,  testimony  respecting  Igna- 
tius' letters,  287. 

"Ezechiel,"  article  by  Baumgarten, 
334. 

Fabri,  Dr.,  Brief  en  gegen  den  Material- 

ismus,  103. 
Faith,  the  Christian,  great  question 

regarding  it  now,  20. 
Feuerbach :  an  atheist,  22  ;  strong  ad- 
vocate of  materialism,  24. 
Fichte,  J.  H.,  on  the  Trinity,  61. 
Fischer,  Phil.,  on   the   form  of  the 

earth,  86. 
Fish,  the  Perca  Scandens,  or  Anabus 

Cuvieri,  climbs  trees,  82. 
Fons  totius  Deitatis,  52. 
Fossil  human  remains,  classification 

of,  91. 
Fossil  skeletons  of  strangely  formed 

animals,  90. 
France,  ineffectual  schemes  for  saving 

of,  376. 
Fuchs,  Rev.  M.,  his  lecture,  147. 


Geoffroy,  says  cochineal  is  an  insect, 

82. 
Germany,  in  deepest   disgrace   after 

battle  of  Jena,  376,  377. 
Gervinus,  historian  of  literature,  391. 
Gess,  W.  F.,  D.  D.,  his  lecture,  253. 
Ghiberti,    Lorenzo,    his    reliefs    on 

Gates  of  Paradise,  384. 
God,  The  Biblical  Conception  of, 

19-63. 
God  :  a  spirit,  38,  40 ;  holy  love,  40,  41 ; 

a  Father,  41,  42. 
Goethe :  on  power  of  religion,  19 ;  on 

pantheism,  25 ;  on  deistic  view  of  the 

world,  159, 160  ;  his  "  Affinities  "  and 

"Stella,"  369;    his    "Faust"    and  _ 

"Iphigenie,"  391;  his  "Stella"  and    Herodotus,  rejected  reports  of  circum 

second  part  of  "  Faust,"  392.  '     navigation  of  Africa,  77. 

2A 


Goppert,  transformed  vegetable  and 
animal  substances  into  stone  coal 
by  application  of  extreme  heat,  98. 

Gospels,  The  Authenticity  of  Our, 
281-300;  oldest  Latin  and  oldest 
Syriac  translation,  284;  the  Synop- 
tics and  John,  296-298. 

Gothic  cathedral,  the  triumph  of  ar- 
chitecture, 382. 

Grau,  Charles  Darwin,  and  August 
Schleicher,  79. 

Grim,  definition  of  Aberglaube,  75. 

Gudrun,  The,  an  old  German  poem. 


Hagia  Sophia,  church  or  mosque  in 
Constantinople,  382. 

Hamann:  on  service  of  philosophy, 
362;  on  marriage  relation,  368;  on 
explanation  of  events,  380 ;  on  pre- 
tended soundness  of  reason,  381 ; 
indicated  the  germs  of  a  Christian 
philosophy,  382. 

Hamilton,  a  Himalaya  explorer,  78. 

Handel,  his  music  as  affected  by  Chris- 
tianity, 385. 

"  Harmonies  of  Grospels  "  by  Tatian 
and  Theophilus,  284. 

Hartwig,  G.,  Gott  in  der  Natur,  83. 

Harvey,  his  discovery  of  the  circula- 
tion of  blood  discredited,  83. 

Hase,  in  Hidt.  rediv.,  75. 

Heer,  Oswald,  his  theory  of  differently 
warmed  spaces  through  which  our 
solar  system  passes,  98. 

Hegel :  his  conception  of  God,  26  ;  on 
doctrine  of  Trinity,  61 ;  on  soul  as 
organ  for  revelation,  312 ;  on  devel- 
opment of  all  life,  317 ;  on  ethics 
not  holding  good  in  politics,  380. 

Heine,  destroyer  of  his  own  genius, 
392. 

"Heliand,  The,"  old  German  poem. 


Heraclitus,  God  the  universal  measure 
of  the  world's  becoming,  39. 

Herbertists,  declared  "the  King  of 
heaven  must  be  dethroned."  22. 

Heracleon,  a  disciple  of  Valentine, 
290. 


402 


GENERAL    INDEX 


Himalayas,  the  snow  limits  of,  78,  79. 

Hippolytus:   oa  Valentine,  289;  on 
Basilides,  290. 

Hodgson,  discovered  one-horned  ante- 
lope, 83. 

Homer,  represents  man  as  most  un- 
fortunate, 356. 

Holsten,  visionary  theory  of,  of  Jesus' 
resurrection,  223-239. 

Horace:  on  putrefaction  of  Roman 
life,  352 ;  on  corruption  of  marriage 
and  the  family,  368. 

Humanism,  361. 

Hutton,  James,  one  of  the  earliest 
geologists,  88. 

Huxley,  draws  weapons  from  Lyellian 
quietism,  94. 

Huyghens,  opposed  Newton's  system 
of  gravitation,  80. 

Hymn,  the  evangelical,  its  remark- 
able character  and  influence,  391. 

Jansenism,  destroyed  in  France,  376. 
Japanese,  theory  which  would  admit 

their  culture,  322. 
"Jaxthausen,  a  castle  on  the  Jaxt," 

312. 
Jenner,  his  discovery  of  vaccination 

discredited,  83. 
Jericho,  near  this  city  Jesus  disclosed 

the  purpose  of  his  dying,  255. 
Jesus  Christ,  The   Person  of,  181- 

206. 
John,  a  Dane  who  made  observations 

on  the  Perca  Scandens,  82. 
John,  prologue  to  his  Gospel  recently 

discovered,  288. 
Josephus,  knew  about  the  intuitive 

consciousness,  312. 
Joshua,  his  appeal  to  the  people,  63. 
Justin  Martyr,  his  apology,  285. 

Kepler:  needed  faith  for  his  astro- 
nomical discoveries,  72 ;  one  of  the 
heroes  of  science,  152. 

Kilimanjaro,  a  snow-crowned  moun- 
tain in  Equatorial  Africa,  72. 

Kinkel,  a  German  poet :  on  the  here- 
after, 370 ;  on  the  quiet  of  a  Chris- 
tian parsonage,  370. 

Kingdom  of  God  as  Consummated, 
The   Idea  of  the,  and  What  It 


TELLS  Us  Regarding  Historical 
Christianity,  305-344. 

Kirchmann,  Herr  von:  public  de- 
mands regarding  society,  369;  his 
views  on  the  nature  and  object  of 
culture,  394. 

Klopstock,  his  "  Messias  "  the  dawn  of 
second  blooming  period  in  German 
poetry,  391. 

KrafE,  an  African  explorer,  79. 

L'Aigle,  fall  of  aerolites  near,  81. 

Lacepede,  authority  on  the  Perca 
Scandens,  82. 

Lalande,  his  atheism,  48. 

La  Mettrie,  a  French  atheist,  22. 

Lange,  J.  P.,  d.  d.,  his  lecture,  305. 

Language,  influenced  by  Christianity, 
377. 

Laocoon,  shows  despotic  power  of 
fate,  355. 

La  Place :  his  atheism,  48 ;  calcula- 
tions on  earth's  oblateness,  85. 

Lavoisier,  needed  faith  to  make  his 
chemical  discoveries,  73. 

Leeambye  River,  79. 

Leibnitz,  opposed  Newton's  system  of 
gravitation,  80. 

Leonhardt,  W.,  feels  force  of  argu- 
ment against  Lyellian  quietism,  99. 

Libanius,  on  excellence  of  Christian 
women,  367. 

Liebig,  his  faith  and  chemical  discov- 
eries, 73. 

Life-principle,  whether  there  Is  a  com- 
mon one  is  matter  of  dispute,  87. 

Linnaeus,  his  faith  and  discoveries  in 
zoology,  72. 

Livingstone,  his  reports  concerning 
identity  of  Leeambye  and  Zambesi 
rivers  discredited,  79. 

Livy,  on  elements  of  decomposition 
in  highest  Roman  culture,  352. 

Louis  XIV.  and  Louis  XV.,  brilliant 
times  of,  still  carried  barbarism  in 
their  bosom,  359. 

Liicke,  correspondent  of  Schleier- 
macher,  150. 

Luthardt,  Chr.  E.,  D.  D.,  his  lecture, 
181. 

Luther,  on  relation  of  believing  soul 
to  Christ,  274,  275. 


GENERAL    INDEX 


403 


Lytton,  Edward  Bulwer,  his  trausla- 
tions  of  Schiller,  395,  396. 

Magnetism,  animal,  83. 

Mallet,  Dr.,  remark  of  touching  the 

"  light  troops  "  of  unbelief,  73,  152. 
Manschot,  Leber  den  Opfertod  Jesu,  328. 
Marcion,  heretical  teacher  of  second 

century,  290. 
Marco  Polo,  his  reports  respecting  the 

East  disbelieved,  78. 
Marriage,   influence   of    Christianity 

upon,  369. 
Materialism:  described,  23,  24;  pro- 
test against,  29 ;  truth  in,  32, 33  ;  see 

also  p.  152. 
Mayer,  J.  R.,  author  of  famous  heat 

hypothesis,  86. 
Meadows,  G.  P.,  "  The  Chinese,"  99. 
Medical  "school  of  skeptics,"  87. 
Medici,  the,  their  brilliant  times  and 

barbarism,  359. 
Megasthenes,    ancient  authority  on 

India,  77. 
Meinecke,  in  Neumann's  Zeitschr.,  80. 
Menken,  Godfrey,  on  necessity  of  the 

atonement,  259,  260. 
Mephistopheles,  in  Goethe's  "  Faust," 

on  value  of  reason,  362. 
Mesmer,  his  doctrine  of  animal  mag- 
netism discredited,  83. 
"  Messer    Milione,"     nickname    for 

Marco  Polo.  78. 
Milton,  his  "  Paradise  Lost "  molded 

by  biblical  Christianity,  388. 
Missions,    Christian,   their   influence 

upon  heathen  peoples,  375,  376,  378. 
Miracles,  147-176. 
Mobius,  K.,  Das  Meerleuchten,  81. 
Moleschott,  J. :  noted  materialist,  24 ; 

drew  weapons   from   the   Lyellian 

quietism,  94. 
Monotheism,  biblical,  33. 
Montholon's  "  Memoirs  of  Napoleon," 

185. 
Mosaic     record,    the,    and     natural 

science,  100-102. 
Muller,  Die  Natur,  83. 
Miiller,  John,  a  physiologist,  73. 
Muller,  John,  great  historian,  made 

Christian  by  considering  unique  po- 
sition of  Christ,  198. 


Muratori  catalogue  of  books  of  New 
Testament,  284. 

Murchison,  does  not  accept  conclu- 
sions of  tlie  Lyellian  quietism,  yy. 

Music  and  singing  as  influenced  by 
Christianity,  384-386. 

Names  applied  to  God  in  the  Scrip- 
tures, 42. 
Napoleon,  his  dififerent  views  of  Christ. 

184,  185. 
Naturalism,  older  name  for  deism,  27. 
Necho,  an  Egyptian  king,  77. 
Neo-gnostic  forms  of  unmannerliness 

appearing  nowadays,  315. 
Neptunism,   doctrines   of    formation 

of  earth  by  action  of  water,  89. 
Neumann's  Zeitschrijt  fur  allgem.  Erd- 

kunde.  83. 
Newton :    faith  of,  72 ;    one    of  the 

"  heroes  of  science,"  152. 
Nibelungen,  The,  old  German  poem, 

386. 
Nile,  countries  recently  discovered  at 

source  of,  79. 
Niobe,  the  statue  and  power  of  fate, 

355. 
Nitzsch,  what  Christianity  has  done 

for  cultureless  peoples,  375. 

Oetinger,  the  "Magus  of  the  South," 
assails  shallow  dogmatism  of  the 
skeptics,  84. 

Organ,  the,  a  child  of  Christianity, 
3.S4. 

Origen,  on  date  of  Celsus'  death,  291. 

Painting,  as  influenced  by  Christian- 
ity, 382. 

Palestrina,  eminent  Christian  mu- 
sician, 385. 

Pantheism:  described,  24-26;  protei^t 
against,  29,  30 ;  truth  in,  33,  34 ;  see 
also  152. 

Papacy,  Occidental  and  Oriental,  321, 
322. 

Papal  Church,  its  ruinous  power.  361. 

Papias,  account  of  him  given  by  Euse- 
bius,  288. 

Paschal  lamb,  the,  2.57. 

Paul,  his  quotation  from  Greek  poet, 
124. 


404 


GENERAL    INDEX 


Pearson,  quotation  from,  27. 

Percival,  the  jewel  of  German  art- 
poetry,  387. 

Pericles,  the  times  of,  359. 

Personality,  the  absolute  and  relative, 
364. 

Perty,  recognizes  the  intuitive  con- 
sciousness, 312. 

Petermann's  geography,  79. 

Peysonnel,  on  coral,  82. 

Philosophy,  as  influenced  by  Chris- 
tianity, 381,  382. 

Phlogiston,  Stahl's  theory  of,  94. 

Piato,  Fernan  Mendez,  his  discoveries 
disbelieved,  78. 

Pilate,  question  of,  "  What  is  truth? " 
76. 

Plato:  acknowledges  need  of  revela- 
tion, 116 ;  man  the  measure  of  all 
things,  117 ;  his  mistaken  ideas  of 
culture,  356,  357 ;  teaches  personal- 
ity of  God,  384. 

Plutarch,  on  superstition,1124. 

Plutonism,  doctrine  of  formation  of 
earth  by  action  of  fire,  88. 

Poetry,  as  influenced  by  Christianity, 
386-392. 

Poison's  theory  of  differently  warmed 
spaces,  98,  99. 

Poisons,  little  known  of  their  chemi- 
cal combination  and  action,  87. 

Polycarp,  letter  of,  288. 

Political  life,  as  influenced  by  Chris- 
tianity, 370-373. 

Positivists,  so  the  negative  thinkers  in 
Paris  style  themselves,  308. 

Presens6,  on  significance  of  Jesus'  res- 
urrection, 241. 

Ptolemy,  a  disciple  of  Valentine,  290. 

Quietism,  the  Lyellian :  opposed  to 
biblical  account  of  creation,  91-95 ; 
disproved  (1)  by  fact  of  its  con- 
founding creation  with  preserva- 
tion, 95, 96  ;  (2)  by  fact  of  incidental 
circumstances  controlling  geologi- 
cal changes,  96,  97;  (3)  by  proba- 
bility of  forces  operating  in  times 
past  which  are  not  now  recogniza- 
ble, 97,  98;  (4)  by  astronomical 
probabilities  and  postulates  respect- 
ing a  higher  degree  of  heat  obtain- 


ing anciently  than  now,  98,  99 ;  (5) 
by  fact  that  historical  traditions  of 
oldest  nations  do  not  go  back  farther 
than  from  2500  to  2700  B.  c,  99. 

Racine,  "  Esther  "  and  "  Athalie,"  390. 

Rationalistic  view  of  God,  26,  27 ;  pro- 
test against,  30-32  ;  truth  in,  35,  36. 

Rebmann,  an  African  explorer,  79. 

Renan :  his  conception  of  Jesus,  189 ; 
his  theory  of  Jesus'  resurrection,  221. 

Resurrection  of  Christ,  The,  as  a. 

SOTERIOLOGICO  -  HISTORICAL      FACT, 

211-248. 
Revelation,    Reason,    Conscience, 

AND,  109-142. 
Ritter,  Karl,  on  influence  of  Christian 

missions,  376. 
Ritualists,  tendency  of  appearing  in 

Germany,  315. 
Rokatanski,  head  of  a  medical  school 

at  Vienna,  87. 
Ross,  John,  Arctic  explorer,  78. 
Rosse,  Lord,  nebulae  resolved  by,  80. 
Ruscher,  proved  that  the  cochineal  is 

an  insect,  82. 

Sabbath,  The,  what  Christianity  does 
for  it,  373. 

Salpse  generate  by  alternation,  82. 

Salamander,  mistaken  by  Scheiizer 
for  a  man  who  perished  in  the  flood, 
90 

Schaaffhausen,  Prof.,  on  date  of  oldest 
human  fossil,  91. 

Schelling :  his  definition  of  God,  39 ; 
approaches  very  closely  the  Chris- 
tian view  of  the  Trinity,  61. 

Schenkel :  his  theory  of  resurrection 
of  Christ,  239, 240,  245  ;  says  that  con- 
science alone  relates  to  Deity,  313. 

Schiller,  his  notion  of  culture,  394-396. 

Schlagintweit,  Rob.  v.  in  Andree's 
"Globus,"  79. 

Schleiden,  remarks  on  nature  of  su- 
perstition, 75. 

Schleiermacher :  on  miracles,  150, 151 ; 
on  lust  in  Greek  popular  life,  357 ; 
theory  of  resurrection  of  Jesus,  217  ; 
letters  about  F.  Schlegel's  "Lu- 
zinde,"  369. 

Scholten,  Die  dltesten  Zeugnisse,  294. 


GENERAL    INDEX 


405 


Schmidt,  calculations  of,  on  the 
earth's  oblateness,  85. 

Schnaase,  on  painting  as  connected 
with  ecclesiastical  themes,  383. 

Schubert,  investigations  touching  the 
earth's  oblateness.  8-5. 

Schwalb,  Ber  alte  und  der  neue  Glaube, 
328. 

Science,  its  indebtedness  to  Christi- 
anity, 378-380. 

Sculpture,  as  influenced  by  Christi- 
anity, 383,  384. 

Sebaldus  Monument,  The,  384. 

"  Seefarht,"  building  in  Bremen  where 
these  lectures  were  delivered,  306. 

Shakespeare :  speaks  powerfully  of  sin 
as  a  law  controlling  the  subject, 
264  ;  his  poetrj'  inconceivable  with- 
out biblical  Christianity,  389. 

Siedler,  De  Skepticisino  Commentatio,  77. 

Sin,  only  biblical  Christianity  makes 
no  compromise  with,  360. 

Skull,  The  Engis,  discovered  by 
Schmerling,  90,  91. 

Socialist  unions,  the  avowed  aims  of 
many  of  them  atheistic,  22. 

Socrates :  what  is  narrated  of  him  by 
Plato  in  his  "Charmidas,"  357;  his 
Sai/u.6viov,  312. 

Spallanzani,  gives  description  of  inter- 
nal state  of  Stromboli,  89. 

Speke,  an  African  explorer,  79. 

Spiegel,  Zeitschrift,  etc.,  93. 

Spinoza :  the  father  of  Occidental  pan- 
theism, 25 ;  genesis  of  his  conception 
of  the  Deity,  56. 

Spontaneous  generation,  a  disputed 
doctrine  until  recently,  87. 

Stein,  minister,  his  indignation  at 
abuses  mflicted  on  hymnology  by 
unbelief,  391. 

Steitz,  Ulrich,  Die  Schopfiingsgeschichte 
nach  Geologic  und  Bibel,  101. 

Stephens,  "  Hist,  of  Methodist  Church 
in  America,"  83. 

Stones,  showers  of,  near  L'Aigle,  80, 
81. 

Strabo,  disbelieved  the  testimony  of 
Megasthenes  and  Daimachus  regard- 
ing India,  77. 

Strauss :  on  the  theory  of  Jesus  being 
only  apparently  dead,  218;  felt  the 


impossibility  of  so  great  a  change  in 
the  disciples  in  only  three  days, 
230;  his  delusion  theory  of  Jesus' 
resurrection,  233 ;  on  significance  of 
Jes\is'  resurrection,  241. 

Suffrage  Vniversel,  332. 

Suidas,  93. 

Swammerdam  and  Leeuwenhoeck, 
Dutch  naturalists,  their  microscop- 
ical discoveries  discredited  a  cen- 
tury after  made,  81. 

Tertullian,  accused  of  falsely  attrib- 
uting to  Marcion  a  knowledge  of 
the  Gospels,  291. 

Testaments  of  the  Twelve  Patriarchs, 
292. 

Theism  biblical,  28-50. 

Theseus,  temple  of,  at  Athens,  382. 

Tholuck,  on  fatherhood  of  God,  42. 

Thorwaldsen,  his  "Christ  and  the 
Twelve  Apostles,"  384. 

Thucydides,  on  elements  of  decompo- 
sition in  highast  Greek  life,  352. 

Tiberius,  Roman  emperor,  heathen 
writers  tell  of  Jesus'  crucitixion 
during  his  reign,  185. 

Tischendorf,  Constantin,  his  lecture, 
281. 

Trinitarian  Conception  of  the  Divine 
Nature,  50-63 ;  supports  of  doctrine 
from  history,  5-5-57  ;  advantages  de- 
rived from  doctrine,  57,  58 ;  collat- 
eral arguments  from  speculative 
theology,  58,  59;  reflections  of  the 
idea  in  human  nature  and  in  crea- 
tion generally,  59-61 ;  proved  also  by 
philosophy,  61-63. 

Tractarians,  among  recent  appear- 
ances in  Germany,  315. 

Truth,  the  Greek  word  for,  121. 

Turkish  Empire  and  the  Chinese,  re- 
main the  only  non-Christian  States, 
374. 

Tyndall,  paper  of,  before  British  nat- 
ural science  gathering  at  Norwich, 


Ulrici,  GoU  und  die  Natur,  83,  86,  87. 
Ulrick  von  Wiirtemberg,  Duke,  delu- 
sions respecting,  233. 
Ukerwi,  lake  in  Equatorial  Africa,  79. 


406 


GENERAL    INDEX 


Valentine,  ancient  heretical  teacher, 
289. 

Vaccination,  discovery  of,  83. 

Venus,  The  Medicean,  beautiful  form 
concealing  a  corrupt  cultural  life, 
355. 

Vespucius,  Americus,  geographical 
discoveries  of  discredited,  78. 

Victoria  Nyanza,  lake  in  Equatorial 
Africa,  79. 

Vilmar,  Pastoral  theol.,  90. 

Vischer,  Peter,  his  statues  and  reliefs 
on  the  Sebaldus  Monument,  384. 

Vogt,  C. :  a  noted  materialist,  24; 
draws  weapons  from  the  Lyellian 
quietism,  94. 

Voltaire,  his  "Zaire"  and  "Alzire" 
pervaded  by  Christian  life-emotions, 
390. 

Von  Der  Decken,  his  expedition  as- 
cended Mount  Kilimanjaro  in  Af- 
rica, 80. 

Von  Auberlen,  85. 

Von  Baer,  R.  E.,  does  not  agree  wholly 
with  the  long-time  view  of  the 
world's  creation,  99. 

Von  Chamisso,  discovered  peculiar- 
ities respecting  the  Salpse,  82. 

Von  Daldorff ,  testimony  respecting  the 
Perca  Scandens,  82. 

Von  Eschenbach,  Wolfram,  author  of 
"Percival,"  387. 

Von  Haller,  Albrecht,  on  disbelief  of 
African  king,  84,  85. 

Vulcanist,  one  who  believes  in  forma- 
tion of  earth  by  the  action  of  fire, 


Wagner,  R.,  needed  faith,  73. 


Wagner,  Andr.,  Die  Bemfung,  etc.,  98. 

Wagner,  A.,  and  the  Lyellian  quiet- 
ism, 98. 

Walther  von  der  Vogelweide  and  his 
song,  387,  388. 

Wann  wurden  unsere  Evangelien  ver- 
fasstf  294. 

Wappaus,  Dr.,  statistics  regarding 
crime,  262. 

Webb,  a  Himalaya  explorer,  78. 

Wellingtonians  (Sequoias),  trees  in 
California,  81,  82. 

Werner,  Abraham,  one  of  the  first 
scientific  geologists,  88. 

Wieland,  conversation  of,  with  Napo- 
leon, 184. 

Winkelmann,  indignant  at  abuses  in- 
flicted on  the  hymn  by  unbelief, 
391. 

Woodward,  C,  on  trinity  in  unity  of 
light,  60. 

Wundt,  W.,  Die  physikalischen  Axiome, 
etc.,  86. 

Xenophanes,  a  Greek  philosopher,  24, 
25. 

Young,  T.  R.,  "Modern  Skepticism 
Viewed  in  Relation  to  Modern  Sci- 
ence," 77. 

Zambesi,  river  in  Africa,  79. 
Zedlitz,  his  lines  on  Byron,  392. 
Zockler,  Otto,  his  lecture,  69. 
Zollman,  on  chance  as  creator  of  the 

world,  157. 
Zollner,  J.,    Ueber  die  tiniverselle  Be- 

deutung  der  mechanischen  Principien, 


